In 2025, more than 5,800 housing units were constructed in New Hampshire, the highest number since 2006, according to a new report from the state Department of Business and Economic Affairs. But despite this recent high, the report said the state has met only about 80% of its building goal between 2020 and 2025, which aims to balance the housing market by 2040.
In 2024, municipalities issued permits for 5,822 housing units. “[Assuming all permitted units were constructed in 2025,” the report said, “New Hampshire has added 25,688 housing units since 2020.” But a 2023 assessment from NH Housing said the state needed to build 32,704 housing units during that 5-year period. That would keep it on track for its 2040 goal, which calls for building 88,364 additional units between 2020 and 2040.
According to the department, 2025’s pace was only a marginal increase compared to previous years.
“We had a higher level this year, and I’m not meaning like thousands and thousands more, but it was higher this year than in the past 20 years,” said Heather Shank, director of the department’s Division of Planning and Community Development.
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The state has added 4,000 housing units or more every year since 2018, according to the report.
Shank said this construction has not been spread evenly throughout the state.
“Larger communities, those that have the most infrastructure . . . produce the highest number of housing every year,” she said. “But there have been additional smaller communities that have been very pro-housing that have produced a lot of units as well, such as Lebanon or Portsmouth.”
The report found that just over 20 towns and cities, where nearly half of the state’s population lives, built nearly two thirds of the new housing in 2025. Most of the new development was concentrated in the Southern Tier or the Seacoast, with Dover, Londonderry, Manchester, Rochester and Portsmouth issuing the most building permits in 2024.
While the state overall failed to meet its five-year production goal, certain areas exceeded their local goals. The North Country Council, Strafford Regional Planning Commission, and the Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Regional Planning Commission all surpassed their building aims.
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Office of Planning and Development
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New Hampshire Department of Business and Economic Affairs
In recent years, municipalities are increasingly building multi-family housing.
The type of housing being built in the state has evolved in recent years, according to Shank.
“The percentage of multi-family [housing] has been growing and the percentage of single-family, in terms of the whole, has been less,” she said.
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According to the report, single-family permits constituted 36% of the total issued statewide, down from 46% in 2023.
In Hillsborough, Rockingham, Strafford, Merrimack, and Grafton counties, the majority of permits issued in 2024 were for multi-family housing.
The report attributes this shift to the InvestNH program, which is funded by the federal American Rescue Plan Act and primarily supported multi-family housing initiatives.
In 2025, a successful bipartisan effort helped enact new laws designed to encourage more building by loosening zoning restrictions and limiting individual towns’ local control.
This legislative session has seen myriad attempts to roll back these initiatives.
A staple of many New Hampshire town fairs, the pig scramble may soon look a little different.
A bill signed into law by Gov. Kelly Ayotte last week requires the commissioner of the state Department of Agriculture to create best practices for any event in which people compete to capture a pig. Those guidelines will be published before the 2027 fair season, so they won’t be in place for any fairs with pig scrambles this year, such as the upcoming Deerfield Fair in the fall.
Generally, a pig scramble involves people of the same age competing to capture pigs that have been let loose in a large pen. Contestants have to catch the pig in a drawstring bag, and the first one to do so can take the pig home.
Rep. Cathryn Harvey, a Democrat from Spofford, is the prime sponsor of the bill. She said each fair has different rules for their pig scrambles, meaning some can be more humane than others. One aspect of the events she hopes will change is the bags pigs are captured in.
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“They’re putting an animal in a plastic bag on a hot summer day,” Harvey said. “It isn’t a great idea.”
Although some fairs already use more breathable bags out of burlap, Joan O’Brien, president of the New Hampshire Animal Rights League, said she’s also seen pigs being kept in plastic bags for long periods of time after the event. Not only would a burlap bag improve the pig’s ability to breathe in the heat, she said, but she also wants fairs to require participants to bring an animal carrier for the trip home. Her organization was ultimately in favor of the legislation.
“If you don’t have a carrier, you should not be allowed to leave your pig lying in a bag,” O’Brien said, adding that some fairs already ask contestants to bring carriers. “You should be taking them right home.”
The Deerfield Fair has implemented another rule that O’Brien and Harvey hope becomes part of statewide best practices — having parents supervise their child in the pen. O’Brien once witnessed a child hang a pig upside down by its legs and then lower it headfirst into the bag.
“In the heat of the moment, the kids get excited and they just do whatever it takes to get the pig in the bag,” O’Brien said. She said parents should work with the event referee to make sure their kid is handling the pig humanely.
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Harvey’s bill originally called for pig scrambles to be banned around the state, but both she and O’Brien feel that universal guidelines for fairs would still make the experience better for the animals. Even seemingly small things, Harvey said, like giving the pigs water after the scramble, would be an improvement to the current situation for them.
“I think that the bill will embolden people to speak up at these events,” O’Brien said. “If they think a pig is being mistreated, they’ll be able to say to themselves, ‘I know that there’s supposed to be a rule, so I’m going to say something.’ So I think that would be a good outcome.”
The New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services collected samples of the unknown substance found in Sunapee Harbor and will be testing them tomorrow. Authorities say the spill was contained and prevented from spreading further.
HAMPSTEAD, N.H. (WHDH) – Authorities have launched an investigation after responding to a reported untimely death in Hampstead, New Hampshire, officials said.
The Attorney General’s Office is investigating the untimely death of a woman at a home in Hampstead, Attorney General John M. Formella announced.
While the investigation is just beginning, there is no known threat to the general public at this time.
The exact circumstances surrounding this incident remain under active investigation.
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This is a developing news story; stay with 7NEWS on-air and online for the latest details.
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