The seasonally adjusted average asking price for homes for sale in New Zealand in August was $568,215. This reflects an increase of 5.5% in just one month, since the previous record high national asking price of $538,484 set in July.
Data analysis by realestate.co.nz, New Zealand’s largest property listing website, reveals that the surge in property prices is not limited to Auckland, where a new record asking price of $832,613 was reached (up from the previous record $820,016 in June 2015).
Eight of the nineteen regions across the country achieved record high average asking prices in August. These include Wellington, where the average asking price was $479,399 (up from the previous record of $469,487 set in March 2014); Canterbury, with an average asking price of $475,066 (up from $473,011 in June 2015); and Waikato, with an average asking price of $403,640 (up from $398,251 in July 2015).
Significantly higher prices were also recorded in the Bay of Plenty, the Central North Island and Hawkes Bay.
“The pressure on the Auckland market is clearly being felt in neighbouring regions as well, especially Waikato and Bay of Plenty,” says Brendon Skipper, CEO of realestate.co.nz.
“The low inventory does not mean that there are fewer homes on the market, but rather that the turnover is faster,” says Skipper. “In fact, listings nationally are up 12.8% compared to a year ago.”
In conjunction with the record prices nationally, the inventory of properties for sale is at its lowest level since January 2007, when realestate.co.nz started tracking this metric. Inventory is a measure of supply and demand that indicates how long it would take, in theory, for all the current properties on the market to be sold at the current average rate of sales.
The national inventory in August was a mere 17 weeks, compared to the long-term average of 35 weeks. The shortage of inventory is most acute in the major centres – 9 weeks in Auckland, 12 weeks in Wellington, 14 weeks in Waikato and 18 weeks in Canterbury. The only region where the inventory is above the long-term average is West Coast, where there is 230 weeks of inventory, compared to a long-term average of 129.