Sunday was a heavy workday for Israeli real estate, and the biggest moves happened where nobody was looking. Between Sunday morning and Monday morning, the Israel Land Authority’s own tender register shows land for about 8,250 homes changing status in some way (our tally from the register): 13 tenders holding 2,619 planned homes were pulled back from bidding, led by Haifa’s 800-home Neve Sha’anan tender, with new closing dates in November and December. At the same time 17 tenders opened for bids on Monday morning, carrying 4,089 homes, and not one of them has a published bid book. Ashkelon’s 1,116-home tender got six more weeks, and Arad got a brand new 426-home tender for its city center. Away from the land desk, the statistics bureau’s first read of the second quarter shows investment in home building jumped 19.4% at an annual rate, a sharp turn after the spring slump. In Jerusalem, the district committee moved a 261-home rebuild of four old buildings on Carmon Street in Beit HaKerem toward public objections, and Globes revealed that mall giant Melisron wants to turn a housing-and-hotel plot near the Armon HaNetziv promenade into a 35,000 square meter mall. In Herzliya, Yuvalim won a court-run auction that values a 4-dunam plot at NIS 200 million.
The state pulled 13 land tenders the same weekend it opened 17 more
The Israel Land Authority made two opposite moves at once, and put out no announcement about either. We found both by comparing the authority’s tender register on Sunday morning against Monday morning.
The first move: 13 tenders that were already open for bids went back to “published, not yet open.” Eleven of them carry homes, 2,619 in total. The largest is Haifa’s Neve Sha’anan tender for 800 homes, which had opened on August 10. Kiryat Ata lost 599 homes from the bidding list, Geva Binyamin 342, Bnei Ayish 424 across two tenders, Netanya’s Nordau quarter 200, and Lod’s International Quarter 150. Most had shared a September 7 closing date. Their new closing dates now sit in November and December. On a home-weighted basis, the closing dates moved back 84 days on average, our own calculation from the register’s before-and-after dates. This is the fourth quiet wave of pull-backs since July, a pattern we documented at Israel Quietly Delayed 14 Land Tenders in One Day.
The second move: 17 tenders opened for bids on Monday, 13 of them residential with 4,089 homes. Tzur Hadasa’s Stage C alone holds 1,590 homes, and Binyamina-Givat Ada 1,000. Tel Aviv opened a rare 180-home tender. Every one of the 13 opened without a bid book, the document a builder needs before bidding. Tzur Hadasa’s closing date is September 14, which leaves a 28-day bidding window, short for a tender of that size (our count from the register dates). Two more register facts round out the weekend: Ashkelon’s 1,116-home tender moved its close from September 7 to October 19, and a new 426-home tender was published for the center of Arad, opening September 23.
A builder or buyer tracking any of these towns should treat press “opening dates” with doubt and check the register row itself: a tender with no bid book is open in name only, and a tender that opened last week can be gone this week. Source: the Israel Land Authority tender register, August 16 and 17 snapshots.
The money going into home building jumped 19.4%
Israel’s economy grew at a 15.4% annual rate in the second quarter, the statistics bureau said in its first estimate on Sunday. That is the bounce back from the war quarter: output fell 2.2% in the first quarter, and the annual rate stretches one strong quarter across a full year. Quarter on quarter, growth was 3.6%.
The housing line inside the release matters more than the headline. Investment in residential building rose 19.4% at an annual rate. In plain terms, builders and their backers put about 4.5% more money into home construction in the quarter itself than in the one before (our conversion of the annual rate to a single quarter). Investment in non-residential building barely moved, up 0.5%.
This is money going into sites now: land work, concrete, labor. It restarts a supply engine that had slowed while sales froze. The unsold-homes backlog is already above 84,000, a picture we laid out at New Home Sales Jump 38%, but 84,000 Flats Sit Unsold. For a buyer, the message is patience with a clock on it: builders are producing again, so today’s wide choice is not about to vanish, but the projects being funded now will hit the market in two to four years, not this fall. Source: Central Bureau of Statistics, first estimate for Q2 2026, August 16.
Four buildings on Carmon Street make way for 261 Jerusalem homes
The Jerusalem district planning committee approved for deposit a merged pinui-binui plan for Carmon 14 to 20 in Beit HaKerem. The decision came last week and reached the trade press on Sunday. Deposit means the plan now goes on public display, and anyone affected can file an objection before it can be approved.
The plan takes down four old buildings holding 88 flats on a 6.9-dunam strip. In their place: 261 new homes, roughly three new homes for each one demolished (our ratio from the plan’s numbers). Rotshtein and Terra hold the larger piece, Carmon 14 to 18, with 192 homes in a 21-floor tower and two mid-rise buildings. Capital Gold holds Carmon 20, a 20-floor tower with 69 homes designed by architect Michal de la Pergola. The plan adds an underground parking garage, 450 square meters of public buildings, and a widening of Carmon Street itself.
Beit HaKerem is one of Jerusalem’s most stable, in-demand neighborhoods, and 20-floor towers are a change of scale for a street of walk-ups. An owner on or near Carmon Street now has a window to read the deposited file and object or negotiate; a buyer eyeing the street should price in years of construction before the new homes arrive. Source: Nadlan Center, August 16.
Melisron wants a 35,000 square meter mall facing Azrieli’s Malha
Globes revealed on Sunday that Melisron, Israel’s biggest mall owner, bought land in Jerusalem that is zoned for housing and hotels, and is now working to rezone it for a mall of about 35,000 square meters. The company believes Jerusalem lacks a serious regional mall and wants to challenge Azrieli’s Malha mall, which measures about 44,000 square meters. The financial daily ice placed the site near the Armon HaNetziv promenade in the city’s south.
Two things have to happen before any store opens. The rezoning has to pass the planning committees, which means taking land earmarked for homes and hotels out of the housing pool. And Azrieli, the incumbent with everything to lose, can be expected to fight it at every stage. For residents of south Jerusalem, this is the first sign that the area around the promenade may be headed for a commercial upgrade; for anyone holding property nearby, a planning fight worth following in the objections files rather than the headlines. Sources: Globes, August 16, ice, August 16.
A court-run auction prices Herzliya’s Kiryat HaMaslul at NIS 200 million
Yuvalim won a tender for a 4-dunam plot in Herzliya’s Kiryat HaMaslul compound, near the old airfield, at a price reflecting a NIS 200 million valuation for the land, business media reported Sunday. The sale ran as a dissolution-of-partnership process, a court-supervised auction used when co-owners of land cannot agree, and it lifted Yuvalim’s stake in the plot to 53%. The plot carries rights for 158 homes in a 27-floor tower plus an 8-floor building.
The number worth keeping is the benchmark: NIS 200 million for 4 dunam is about NIS 1.27 million of land value per approved home before a single permit fee is paid (our division of the reported valuation by the 158 homes). That is what builders are still willing to pay for central Herzliya land in a slow market, and it sets a floor under what the finished flats will have to cost. Landowners in the Herzliya airfield area now have a fresh, real comp for negotiations. The figures come from the winning company’s announcement as reported by Calcalist, August 16 and Nadlan Center, August 16; no land-registry confirmation is available yet.
Sources
Israel Land Authority tender register (snapshots of August 16 and August 17, 2026) · Central Bureau of Statistics, National Accounts first estimate for Q2 2026 (August 16, 2026) · Nadlan Center on the Carmon Street deposit (August 16, 2026) · Globes on Melisron’s Jerusalem mall plan (August 16, 2026) · ice on the mall site’s location (August 16, 2026) · Calcalist on the Yuvalim purchase (August 16, 2026) · Nadlan Center on the Yuvalim purchase (August 16, 2026)
