As swathes of once-genteel Melbourne suburbia are knocked down to make way for multi-storey developments, many residents have grown increasingly uneasy about the types of apartments they will soon live next to.

So you’d be forgiven for thinking that you could easily find out exactly how many one-bedroom apartments were suddenly in your street. After all, we know how many houses there are.

But it turns out trying to pinpoint the number of neighbours you may have is actually harder than you might think.

Local councils, usually responsible for approving such developments, are not required to collate information on the exact number of different types of apartments.

For example, in McKinnon, where nearly whole streets have given way to several apartment blocks, the Glen Eira council could not tell you how many bedrooms were in the plethora of developments approved or under construction in its patch.

Not even the state government or Australian Bureau of Statistics regularly keep tabs on the diversity of apartments approved across the city and whether there will be enough to cater for families.

It comes as debate rages about affordability, the type of apartments being constructed and whether those apartments should be regulated by size. It also comes as developers continue to regularly trump regular buyers at auctions for houses on large blocks — perfect for family living, but equally perfect for high-density living.

There are no requirements for developers to provide a mix of apartment types in Sydney or Melbourne, but there is at least a minimum size requirement in NSW. And it may not be enough for individual councils to regulate by type.

In Sydney, the City of Botany Bay requires a mix of apartment types in larger developments; not to include more than 25 per cent of studio and one-bedroom apartments. But the council’s regulations were successfully challenged by a developer in the NSW Land and Environment Court in 2015, according to a recent Australian Population Research Institute research report.

Co-author Bob Birrell says a few Sydney local councils had established rules around the diversity of apartment types, but struggled against the state government which could override it. The NSW and Victorian governments were “mainly concerned about cranes on horizons … rather than thinking about the relevance of what’s being built for the underlying demand”.

Family-friendly apartments would become more important in the next decade, he said, and the market would have to adjust when developers “hit the wall with the explosion of tiny one and two-bedroom apartments, so have to think twice about what they’re building”.

Angie Zigomanis, of construction forecaster BIS Shrapnel, says developers need presales to get projects off the ground, and investors are then the buyers most likely to purchase one or two-bedroom apartments.

Dr Birrell says regulation in the diversity of apartments could be part of the solution, but high site and building costs in inner and middle-ring suburbs made it difficult for developers to build family-friendly apartments.

Building three and four-bedroom apartments did not just involve adding floor area for the extra bedroom; there would typically be larger living areas, bigger kitchens and multiple bathrooms and parking spaces, HIA economist Geordan Murray says. When those additional costs were accumulated, it becomes competitive with houses or larger townhouses.

Mr Murray says developers had started to include more larger apartments and fewer single-bedroom apartments over the past year in response to demand from the community.

The City of Melbourne periodically publishes data on bedroom mix, and the latest report from May 2016 shows that of the residential dwellings under construction or approved for development, 52 per cent are two-bedrooms; 42 per cent are one-bedroom; more than 5 per cent have three bedrooms or more; and less than half a per cent are studios.

Planning minister Richard Wynne says the government’s recast vision for Fishermans Bend will ensure a mix of apartment sizes; such as encouraging developments higher than 12 storeys to include at least 30 per cent three-bedroom units.

“Our Better Apartments design standards will improve the design and liveability of new apartments, so that affordability is preserved and the diverse needs of all Victorians are met,” he says.

But for residents grappling with constant change, it is still largely a developer’s prerogative to shape their suburbs.

Joanna Stanley, Brunswick Residents Network spokeswoman, says there have been cases where a developer would go to VCAT to drop positive features after they received a permit from council.

“They’ll go to council, they look like they want to do a mix [of housing], then they’ll go to VCAT and have the social housing removed from the permit or the two-bedders removed and turned into one-bedders,” she says. “There’s a higher problem — the state [government] doesn’t require a mix.”