In the face of a spate of collapses including Pumpkin Patch, Payless Shoes, Marcs, David Lawrence and Herringbone, Stockland's chief executive commercial John Schroder said the collapses had affected just 1.5 per cent of the rent rolls across its shopping centres.

Stockland controls a $7 billion retail property portfolio spanning 42 retail centres.

Mr Schroder said the fallout of the various groups placed into administration over the past 14 months had affected 65 shops out of the group's total 3500 tenancies and there had been relatively little difficulty letting the space.

"It's impacted 1.5 per cent of the gross rent roll, of which 80 per cent of that gross rent has already been replaced. And, importantly, in some instances, it's actually triggered a faster review of the mix and remerchandising [of mall] to better fit the consumer demand in each respective trade area and in the case of the Greenhills shopping centre, Maitland, NSW, and some other areas, it has aided and abetted our development program," Mr Schroder said.

At Greenhills, a former Dick Smith outlet was demolished as part of the redevelopment.

Reflecting the evolution of a shopping centre into a "town centre", Mr Schroder said there is a growing demand for tenants such as medical, health and beauty, "being the things our customers told us that they want and we have delivered".

The surging east coast property market also means Stockland, one of the country's largest home developers, is holding more deposits for its developments than ever before.

The group, which owns offices, shopping centres, logistic centres and retirement living dwellings, on Wednesday reported a statutory profit of $702 million and generated funds from operations (FFO) of $369 million, an increase of 7.8 per cent on the previous corresponding period.

With Sydney, Melbourne and now Brisbane, markets all heading upwards the group enjoyed a 3 per cent rise in sales volumes in the first half, with 2853 lots settled, compared to the corresponding period.

Contracts on hand at the start of January 2017 totalled 5807, a new record for Stockland and an increase of 1698 on the prior corresponding period.

The diversified nature of the business has led the group's chief executive Mark Steinert to issue a tightened full 2017 year guidance to 6-7 per cent FFO growth, which is at the higher end of the previous guidance of 5-7 per cent.

Mr Steinert said this reflects the strong first half, adding Stockland was "on track to deliver a full year distribution of 25.5¢ per security, assuming no material decline in market conditions".

Mr Steinert said given about 52 per cent of its buyers were first home owners, affordability was a focus.

"We are well positioned to play a role in solving the affordability challenge for housing in Australia," Mr Steinert said.

"The average house and land package available in a Stockland community is an 18 per cent discount to the median house price within the trade area. In Sydney, we are offering town houses in the low $500,000s range."

The interim distribution is 12.6¢ per security.

The residential chief executive, Andrew Whitson, said aside from the new Willowdale estate in Sydney, the group has launched a number of new projects over the past 12 months.

That included two of Australia's largest master-planned new cities at Aura on the Sunshine Coast and Cloverton in the northern suburbs of Melbourne.

He said those developments had each posted more than 600 lot sales.

"Stockland maintained guidance for its residential operating profit margin at 15-16 per cent for the full 2017 year. With continuing favourable market conditions, we are targeting our residential operating profit margin to remain above 15 per cent over the short to medium term," Mr Whitson said.

Retirement living maintained its rise, with an operating profit up 43.8 per cent due largely to improved margins and occupancy, and the timing of superlot and asset sales. Cash return on assets increased to 6.4 per cent at December 31 2016.

Despite a rocky retail landscape, the division saw comparable FFO up 3.5 per cent on the same time last year.

Commercial Property chief executive John Schroder, said the company's strategy was actively remix its retail offerings around food, health, services, lifestyle, leisure and technology.

"The strongest specialty categories in Stockland centres were retail services, up 7.8 per cent, fast casual dining and food catering, up 6.6 per cent, and communication and technology, up 3.6 per cent on a comparable basis," Mr Schroder said.