Maine communities approved building permits for nearly 7,500 homes in 2025, surpassing the state’s housing production goal by 9%.
That comes from the first wave of new data posted Friday on the State of Maine Housing Data Portal, which is required by a bill Gov. Janet Mills signed into law last year designed to monitor if the state is on track to mitigate its housing shortage.
Knowing how many units and what kind of homes are being approved, built or demolished allows lawmakers to gauge whether the state is making progress on its goal of building 84,000 new units by 2030. That goal was set by the Maine Housing Production Needs Study, published in late 2023, which credited the state’s housing shortage to historic underproduction.
We assembled five charts that show what areas of Maine are seeing the most housing growth and what kind of properties are being built.
Only about half of counties met their housing permit goals
Most of the new housing growth is concentrated around southern Maine, as Cumberland and York counties approved the most housing permits at 1,845 and 1,445 units, respectively.
Kennebec and Androscoggin counties each approved more than 500 new units, followed by Penobscot and Oxford counties, which permitted more than 400 units each.
Despite their high volume, Cumberland and York counties both fell short of their goals. Less populated counties like Washington and Piscataquis far exceeded their targets.
Overall, nine counties surpassed their annual goals while seven fell short.
Southern Maine created most of the new housing
A housing project can receive a building permit, but never get created or completed for a variety of reasons, such as budget constraints or pushback from local residents. This metric is important to measure because it’s a marker of how many units of housing were created and cleared for someone to live there.
Again, Cumberland and York counties issued the most certificates of occupancy with 1,335 and 913, respectively.
No other county issued occupancy permits for more than 200 units, but Androscoggin gave certificates to 168 homes. Kennebec, Hancock and Oxford counties all cleared a little over 120 homes to be lived in.
Waldo and Aroostook counties each issued fewer than 20 certificates of occupancy in 2025.
The towns approving the most housing include some surprises
As expected, larger municipalities in Cumberland and York counties, especially those in the greater Portland area, approved the most housing last year. This reflects the public’s desire or need to live in southern Maine, especially in urban centers where many jobs, healthcare and other resources are based.
At 548, Portland cleared the most housing to be built, followed by Biddeford, which issued building permits for 220 homes last year.
There are a few outliers, such as Lewiston and Bath, which approved 186 and 106 units, respectively.
Greater Portland is leading the charge with affordable housing
While most of the new affordable housing is concentrated in Cumberland County, communities as far north as Aroostook County are building affordable homes. Presque Isle, for example, gave certificates of occupancy to 18 units last year.
Portland and South Portland issued permits to nearly 150 affordable homes combined, accounting for the vast majority of the affordable housing completed in the state last year.
Waterville, meanwhile, gave certificates of occupancy to 33 affordable units while Farmington completed 25 homes.
Single-family homes dominate the new housing market
Single-family homes still make up the vast majority of new housing being completed in Maine, as they accounted for 60% of the more than 3,260 homes given a certificate of occupancy in 2025.
Buildings with five or more units took second place, as they hold more than 830 units completed last year.
What may come as a surprise is the fact that 253 accessory dwelling units received a certificate of occupancy.
This means ADUs, such as an in-law apartment or a separate structure on someone’s existing property, created more housing than buildings containing two to four units combined.