3 October 2009

According to the latest New Zealand Property Report, the serious shortage of properties seen in the past few months looks to have eased.  With the move into the spring/summer period, it is traditional to see an increase in listings; and in September there were 12,674 new listings up 19% on the previous month.

Despite the uplift in listings during September, the level of new listings over the past 12 months shows a 21% fall with 134,873 new listings in the recent 12 months as compared to 172,711 in the prior 12 months spanning 2007/8.   Even though an increase in listings was seen in September, it is not enough to subdue talk of a looming property shortage in New Zealand.

With this increase in new listings came a substantial increase in asking price expectation with asking prices for the month of September up 6% on the previous month. This spike now takes the asking price expectation back to within 2% of the peak of the market in late 2007.

Coming into spring it was anticipated that both of these figures would lift however the increases seen were much higher than expected.

Alistair Helm who analyses this data in his monthly NZ Property Report said, “While we always expect an increase in both the number of listings and the price expectations during the spring/summer period, this relatively large jump on both figures is a strong indicator of improved health in the property market.”

Most significant increases in asking prices were seen in the Auckland region and the upper North Island.  The Reports states: “This data supports the view that the property marketing is most active in the major metropolitan areas whereas the provincial parts of the country are yet to witness this pick up.”

This reinforces the predictions of leading economists that Auckland will lead New Zealand’s property market recovery and given this recent data, it is already exhibiting strong signs of picking up.

Ref: NZ Property Report - September 2009