Wodonga director planning and infrastructure Leon Schultz said the council's building-related activity for the first quarter of 2021 was about 65 per cent more than the same time last year.

"For the start of this year, we have almost 200 houses being built with another 100 still to enter the system and we are getting more than 20 permit applications a day," he said.

"Last year had the highest number of building inspections carried out by council staff and at the moment they are averaging more than 30 inspections a week.

"We are having to recruit more staff to accommodate the quantity coming through."

Albury Council figures showed 758 construction certificates and complying development certificates were approved between June 2020 and February 2021, an increase of 32 per cent from the same period the previous year (576 approved).

From June 2019 to February 2020 there were 469 development applications, but this jumped to 631 the next year, a rise of 35 per cent.

The council's development monitor revealed 223 lots created in June to December 2020 compared with 173 in the 2019/20 financial year.

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These Albury-Wodonga results coincide with the federal government's HomeBuilder scheme, which ends on Wednesday in terms of contract signings.

The program ran from June to December last year with a $25,000 grant and was then extended to the end of March with funding of $15,000.

Albury mayor Kevin Mack said the council statistics showed a significant uplift but "we've been seeing uplift for a number of years though".

"One of the contributing factors here could be home buyer incentives, but it could also be the fact people aren't travelling and they've got more disposable income, and also the interest rates we're currently experiencing," he said.

"It will be interesting to see what happens when the incentive stops and JobKeeper's just stopped, so those factors will I'm sure also have a significant impact on the downturn of those numbers, so it will be interesting to see what they look like in six to eight months' time."

Mr Schultz said builders had suggested the rise in the new dwellings being built across Wodonga was owing not just to the HomeBuilder grant but also people relocating from the cities.

Cr Mack said as well young families that might once have migrated to metropolitan areas were now staying put.

"You get that dynamic as well as cheaper money, availability of land, availability of that finance they need and, all those things being equal with the pandemic, I suppose you create that marker," he said.

"Albury-Wodonga has always been a strong housing market and it always seems to defy the trend but when we're running at 0.6 per cent of available rental housing at the moment, when we're normally about 1 per cent more, it sort of says to me we're running out of housing stock, so we'll keep encouraging development."

Metricon Homes general manager of regional Victoria Phil Barrett expected a challenging year in the wake of the HomeBuilder grant's popularity.

"There's a huge volume of work coming through, it's not just pressure on tradies and suppliers of materials, it's also all the other areas, such as councils, conveyors, banks," he said.

"It's already starting to slow, instead of just ringing up a concreter and getting them there in two days, there's now sort of a week to 10 days' delay to book them in.

"I think patience is going to be a word that's going to have to be used in the building industry this year."

But Mr Barrett said the HomeBuilder scheme had "absolutely" been a positive initiative.

"The stimulus is going to generate good things for the economy, especially after the year we went through last year with COVID and the effect on businesses," he said.

"Because there's so many flow-ons, there's the tool shop, there's the car dealer that sells the carpenter a new ute, there's more tradies out and about eating at the local lunch shop, it's just ongoing."

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