NZ property market report #8 - 24th September '24

Here’s your monthly property update.

• 🟠 house prices were flat last month. Neither up nor down.
• 🔴 days to sell are up 16.3% year on year. 50 vs 43 days to sell this time last year
• 🔴 the number of listings is up 30.0% year on year. 33,146 listings are currently on the market vs 25,491 this time last year (+7,655).
• 🟠 the number of sales was up 0.9% year on year
• 🟢 the average rent is up 4.3% in July compared to last year.

Over the last 12 months New Zealand property prices are down 0.8%. Though, they were flat last month.

Although some of the numbers appear quite bad … I’m chipper.

Last month’s data ends a 5-month streak where property prices were falling.

Lower interest rates should flow through into higher prices, and real estate agents report that more people are showing up to open homes.

The last 12 months aren’t a good predictor for what will happen in the next 12 months.

It looks like a second chance at the bottom of the market to me.

Here are NZ property prices so you can make your own assessment.

Though, not everything is rosy.

Last month, I talked about how many investors say it is hard to find a good tenant.

The numbers got slightly better this month.

But the rental market is still good for tenants and bad for investors.

The number of rental searches on TradeMe was flat compared to the same time last year. The number of listings were up 25% year-on-year.

So rental demand is flat, and supply is up.

You see the trend clearly here:

Despite that, rents are still rising. The average rent for a:

• 2-bed townhouse is $560, that's up 11% since last year
• 3-bed townhouse is $590, that's up 1% since last year
• 3-bed house is $630, that's up 5% since last year
• 4-bed house is $700, that's up 2% since last year

Ed

P.S. I always get emails from people saying: “Ed, do you have data on [insert suburb here].”

The answer is now “yes”. I’ve just launched my Area Analyser tool. You can use it to look up property data on any suburb, council area or region in New Zealand.

There are a few teething issues I’m working through. After all, there are over 1,000 suburbs in there.

So, let me know if anything looks odd. Otherwise, dig in and check out your area.