Research News

From a housing affordability perspective, New Zealand has entered the current recession on a more stable footing than the previous economic shock of the GFC, according to the inaugural New Zealand Housing Affordability Report from CoreLogic.

The CoreLogic House Price Index (HPI) for August has found property values are still feeling the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, with values slightly down (-0.2%) over the month.

After returning to parity in June, mortgage lending in July was higher than the same month last year, with advances to both owner-occupiers and investors showing annual growth.

The latest Pain & Gain report shows that the proportion of properties being resold for more than the original purchase price in Q2 2020 across New Zealand was 96.1%, down a touch from 97.0% in Q1.

Existing owner-occupiers are largely staying put at present, with first home buyers and especially mortgaged investors raising their market shares (as well as the number of purchases).

The 2020 General Election is fast approaching and even in normal years elections tend to create some uncertainty in the economy and the property market, with investors often finding themselves staring down the barrel of some kind of new tax or regulatory change. But of course, this isn't a normal year.

Recent events are clearly starting to take a toll on property rents in Queenstown, which have fallen by 10% since the same time last year. There are also a few other pockets of weakness across the country, although so far most areas have seen rents hold up pretty well.

The latest research from Auckland Cityscope shows that property sales value have decreased over the past three months. 

According to the July 2020 QV House Price Index (HPI) results out today, property values recorded a marginal increase, up 0.2% over the month. This is somewhat of a turnaround from June, after the national index edged 0.2% lower.

It’s obviously been an unprecedented year for the economy and property market so far in 2020, and unfortunately we’re not out of the woods yet.

The CoreLogic Buyer Classification series has shown that ‘movers’ (i.e. existing owner occupiers who are moving house) are relatively quiet at present, accounting for just 26% of NZ-wide property purchases in Q2 – the norm for this buyer group is closer to 30%.

Mortgage lending in May wasn’t as strong as we had been anticipating, but the lost ground was well and truly recovered in June, with $5.4bn of new loans on a par with the same month last year. This is yet another indicator which signals a return to some kind of normality in the economy and property market....

If we’re right and there’s only about 70,000 property sales this year (versus almost 90,000 last year), gaining market share will be an important consideration for many firms in the sector. Investors have had a rising presence lately, so could be a segment for banks and insurers etc to focus on. Similarly,...