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NZ Property Report – June 2012

Posted on: July 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The June 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of June. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 96% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – June 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.2MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – June 2012

It seems that just as we sensed a stabilizing of the property market in terms of new listings responding to the growing demand as was witnessed in May, the market has swung again and the ever present property shortage just got worse. Worse by not just a small measure! – the current level of inventory is down to the lowest witnessed in 4 years. Across the country there are no regions for which the state of the market could be assessed as even a slight buyers’ market.

This situation has arisen as a consequence of very strong sales in May – the seasonally adjusted total of 6,154 was up 26% on April. In total the first 5 months of this year show sales up 25%. At the same time listings over the same period are only up 9%. To put this into perspective the number of properties on the market across the country at this time is 43,691. If the rate of sale was to continue and no new listings were to be added that stock would be sold out by the last day of December this year. A year ago there were 47,738 properties on the market, at that time the then rate of sales would have meant that it would have taken until the middle of March next year to sell out all that stock.

The months of June, July and August are proportionally the lowest of the year both in absolute terms but also in relation to sales. This 3 month period represents 22.4% of the total listings for the year as opposed to 24% of the sales for the year. If this traditional seasonal situation is experienced this year and the rate of sale continues at current levels it is likely that the NZ property market will reach critically low inventory in absolute terms as the market moves into the key spring season in just 2 months’ time.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price for listings in June eased from the record high of $435,887 set in May to a June level of $424,315. The month-on-month decrease of 2.7% takes the month level to 1.6% up on June last year. As can be seen from the chart the easing in the month does not significantly affect the trend line which continues to show a steady rise over the past 18 months.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in June fell back to 9,689 from 11,544 in May. This represents a seasonally adjusted fall of 8% demonstrating that the sellers are still apprehensive of listing their properties despite the record low inventory.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 130,289 new listings have come onto the market since July 2011 as compared to 125,848 in the prior 12 month period, a rise of just 3.5%.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of June (44,787) was down as compared to May (46,016) as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. The inventory as measured in terms of equivalent weeks of sales shows a significant drop from 35.7 last month to 29.8 weeks this month. This is one of the largest single month drops since the peak of the market for inventory in October 2010.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers eased slightly in June by 2.7% to $424,315.

Across the 19 regions of the country the asking prices generally eased which considering the low inventory across the regions is seen as somewhat surprising. The biggest falls were seen in Taranaki, Northland and the Central Otago / Queenstown lakes area – all falls of 10% or greater on a seasonally adjusted basis. In total there were 11 regions reporting falls in asking price on a seasonally adjusted basis, with just 8 showing increases.

The largest regional increase was seen in Gisborne; a region which does witness volatility as a function of scale. Most notable region reporting an increase was Canterbury which showed a 1.6% seasonally adjusted increase to set a new record level of asking price expectation off the back of a record low level of inventory.

Regional Summary – Listings

Listings volumes in June were light with a 6% year-on-year increase nationally and across the regions the majority showed modest gains.

The regions showing the tightest level of inventory – Auckland and Canterbury showed increases in new listings, however at 11% and 4% increase respectively these levels fail to alleviate the very low inventory.

Three regions – Taranaki, Manawatu / Wanganui and Wiararapa did see strong growth on a year-on-year basis, all up over 25%.

The Wellington market; which had recently seen some growing inventory reported a 6% fall year-on-year with just 691 new listings.

Coromandel reported the biggest fall, with just 156 new listings down 33% on June 2011.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market dropped quite significantly in June. The regional situation paints a clear and comprehensive picture with all regions experiencing a sellers’ market.

The key metro markets of Auckland, Wellington and Canterbury all show inventory below 20 weeks of equivalent sale – in the case of Canterbury and Auckland these are the lowest level going back over 4½ years at 16 weeks and 18 weeks respectively.

In addition to these 3 metro regions a further 6 regions are witnessing levels of inventory significantly below their long term average as indicated by the dark blue boxes on the chart.

There are just 5 regions where inventory is sitting just above the long term average – Central North Island, Gisborne, Marlborough, Southland and Taranaki. All of these have seen a fall in inventory in June and therefore are favouring sellers with an anticipation that the traditional winter shortfall of listings will continue through until September..

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings fell in June in line with the trend of total listing. A total of 808 listings came onto the market, down 2% year-on-year and down 17% as compared to May. The truncated mean asking price for these listings fell 3.1% as compared to the recent 3 month average to $631,579 – easing from the record high in asking price set in May.

Across the country, Northland recorded a record low of new listings with just 48 added in the month as compared to a long term average of 120. Strong growth was seen though in Otago and the Manawatu with year-on-year growth of 23% and 110% respectively.

Apartments

Listings for apartments eased in June from May with 439 being brought to the market, on a year-on-year basis listings were identical to June 2011. The truncated mean asking price of new listings slipped to $360,618 in June from $371,703 in May, representing a 9% year-on-year decrease and down 4% on the recent 3 month average.

The Auckland apartment market followed the national trend with 271 new listings coming onto the market, down just 1% from May and also down 6% from June last year. The truncated mean asking price of new listings fell significantly to $319,979 from $382,064 in May representing a 11% fall on the prior 3 months.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The monthly asking price for new listings presented in this report utilises the measure of ‘truncated mean’. This measure is judged to be a more accurate measure of the market price than average price as it statistically removes the extremes that exist within any property market that can so easily introduce a skew to traditional average price figures.

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

With the largest database of properties for sale in NZ from licensed real estate agents, realestate.co.nz is uniquely placed to immediately identify any changes in the marketplace. The realestate.co.nz NZ Property Report is compiled from new listings coming onto the market from the more than 1,000 licensed real estate offices across NZ, representing more than 95% of all offices.

With an average monthly level of over 10,000 new listings, the realestate.co.nz NZ Property Report provides the largest monthly sample report on the residential property market, as well as a more timely view of the property market than any other property report. The data is collated and analysed at the close of each month, and the Report is compiled for the 1st day of the following month. This provides a feedback mechanism as to the immediate state of the market, well in advance of sales statistics, which by the very nature of the selling process can reflect activity with a lag of between 2 and 4 months.

In analysing the details of the 9,689 new listings in the month of June, a total of 193 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

The core data for the NZ Property Report is seasonally adjusted to better represent the core underlying trend of the property market in NZ. In preparing this seasonally adjusted data Realestate.co.nz is grateful for the assistance of the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research (NZIER) who use an X12 ARIMA methodology to calculate seasonally adjusted data.

Background to Realestate.co.nz

Realestate.co.nz is the official website company of the real estate industry of New Zealand, it is an industry owned web business providing online marketing services to the real estate industry. The shareholders in the business comprise the REINZ (50%) and six of the largest real estate companies (50%).

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

Realestate.co.nz is the heart of the business and is focused to the residential property market. It features the most comprehensive selection of property for sale and rent across NZ. The website attracts a significant monthly audience of over 400,000 unique browsers, with over 110,000 of those visiting from countries outside of NZ.

nzFarms is a specialist website presenting the most comprehensive selection of farms and agricultural businesses on the market across NZ. At this time it features around 5,000 listings for all types of farms and agricultural land as well as over 11,000 lifestyle properties.

Prime Commercial is a specialist website presenting the most comprehensive selection of commercial property for purchase or lease on the market across NZ. At this time it features over 27,000 listings for all types of properties – retail, commercial, industrial and investment properties.

Prime Business is a specialist website presenting the most comprehensive selection of businesses for sale on the market across NZ. At this time it features over 4,300 listings for all types of businesses – retail, tourism, wholesale as well as franchise opportunities.

The web business of Realestate.co.nz site is the most comprehensive real estate web operation in NZ, currently hosting over 110,000 listings, covering this portfolio of residential property for sale and rent, commercial property for sale and lease, rural properties and farms, as well as businesses for sale. With a subscriber base of over 1,000 offices, the company represents over 95% of all listings from licensed real estate agents in NZ.

The full NZ Property Report for June 2011 can be downloaded here (1.2MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for July 2012 will be published on this website on Wednesday 1st August 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, median price, Property prices, Property report

NZ Property Report – May 2012

Posted on: June 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The May 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of May. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 96% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – May 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.2MB) and distribution.

A video interview of the NZ Property Report for May with Bernard Hickey of Interest.co.nz provides a concise 6 minute insight into the market across the country.

Summary of the market – May 2012

The message in the property market for the past 6 months at least, has been that there is a shortage of listings. In the major metro areas of Auckland and Canterbury this shortage has been more acute especially at a suburb level. It appears from the May data on the supply side of the market that this message has finally got through to sellers. The level of new listings in May was counter-seasonal; when we normally see a slowing of new listings coming onto the market heading into winter we actually saw a rise, and quite a significant rise – 16% increase on a seasonally adjusted basis.

This rise in new stock has lead to a fast adjustment in a number of provincial regions where the market was firmly biased to sellers and is now showing a more balanced market. This however is not the outcome in Auckland and Canterbury where despite this surge of new listings, the inventory as measured against the rate of sale has actually fallen, demonstrating the levels of activity in these markets where property is selling fast.

The unseasonal rise in listings has certainly come with an ensuing surge of confidence in those new sellers – they have signaled this confidence in the asking price expectation, which has again set a new record level. This rise was most accentuated in the two key markets of Auckland and Canterbury which both set new record levels of asking price.

The challenge for the market in the coming winter period will be if the surge of listings continues and what impact that will have on the inventory and the ability for the buyer demand evident through the summer/autumn to continue, potentially less of an issue in the major metros than provincial regions.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price for listings in May set a new record high of $435,887, this represents a significant increase from the prior peak in March of this year of $429,865. The month-on-month increase of 2.8% is the highest single increase since Sep 2009. As compares to a year ago the truncated mean asking price is up 4.5%.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in May rose sharply with a total of 11,544. This represents a seasonally adjusted 16% increase. The increase year-on-year is 17%.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 129,711 new listings have come onto the market since June 2011 as compared to 127,843 in the prior 12 month period, a rise of 1.5%. This is the first moving annual total increase in over a year.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of May (46,016) was down as compared to April (46,948) as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. The inventory as measured in terms of equivalent weeks of sales shows a further upturn to 35.7 weeks from 33.7 weeks last month. This is the third straight month with increasing inventory – reversing what had been a 6 month consistent decline from October through to March of this year.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers rose significantly in May by 2.8% to $435,887.

Across the 19 regions of the country the price movements are varied with 11 showing increases and 8 decreases. The major movement are very evident on the East Coast with Gisborne, Hawkes Bay and Manawatu / Wanganui showing steep declines, joined by the West Coast. In contrast the five regions of Wairarapa, Northland, Coromandel, Nelson and Taranaki showed big increases, in the case of the latter region an increase of 15%.

The major metro regions showed slight movement with Auckland being the largest with a 1.7% increase to set a new record asking price of $578,533. Canterbury with a seasonally adjusted increase of just 0.5% though did also set a new record asking price at $383,504. Wellington by contrast was down 0.1% in seasonally adjusted asking price at $429,836 which is 5% below the peak asking price of Feb 2011.

Regional Summary – Listings

Listings volumes coming onto the market in May was well ahead of the seasonal trend which tends to see a slow down as the market heads towards winter. Across the country only one region (Central North Island) showed a decline in new listings as compared to last May.

Significant year-on-year increases of over 20% were seen in 9 of the 19 regions. The largest increases were in the West Coast (75%), Taranaki (72%), Northland (56%) and the Waikato (43%).

It is interesting to align the chart of new listings by region to the inventory by region. Most striking is the fact that the two regions facing the greatest shortage in listings being Auckland and Canterbury saw some of the lowest rise in new listings in the month, well below the national average.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market rose again in May, creeping closer to the long term average as the market re-balances.

This re-balancing is however not occurring in the two major markets of Canterbury and Auckland where the inventory continues to fall. Both Auckland and Canterbury have also reached new record 5 year lows in inventory and now both are over 33% below their respective long term average.

Noticeable outside of these regions is the extent to which the remaining 17 regions are edging out of tight sellers’ markets into more balanced markets and the emergence of some buyers markets. As compared to April when there were 4 provincial markets under strain of a shortage of listings to this month with none. The majority of provincial markets are fairly well balanced between buyer and sellers providing a good balance heading into the slightly quieter winter months.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings rose in May in line with the trend of total listing. A total of 978 listings came onto the market, up 16% year-on-year and up 17% as compared to April. The truncated mean asking price for these listings rose 1.2% as compared to the recent 3 month average to $655,740 – taking the level to another record high in asking price, surpassing the peak attained over the last 3 months. Across the regions, Wellington recorded a new record high of $905,100.

Across the country, year-on-year comparison of new listings were up significantly in the Bay of Plenty (+96%), Taranaki (+92%) and Northland (+64%).

Apartments

Listings for apartments rose in May with 495 being brought to the market, on a year-on-year basis listings were up 22%. The truncated mean asking price of new listings slipped to $371,703 in May from $384,861 in April, representing a 3% year-on-year decrease and down 3% on the recent 3 month average.

The Auckland apartment market followed the national trend with 288 new listings coming onto the market, up 14% from April and also up 8% from May last year. The truncated mean asking price of new listings rose to $362,421 from $359,196 in April representing a 5% rise on the prior 3 months.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 11,554 new listings in the month of May, a total of 373 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

Zoodle is a specialist property information website providing very detailed data on all residential properties in NZ. The database comprises over 1.6m properties with detailed specifications, map and local amenities. The site provides online reports for free and for purchase covering valuation and legal information to greatly assist the needs of property buyers and sellers.

The full NZ Property Report for May 2011 can be downloaded here (1.2MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for June 2012 will be published on this website on Sunday 1st July 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, Property report

Auckland Property Report – April 2012

Posted on: May 2nd, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report, Regional News

This special regional property report on the Auckland market was published for a presentation given to the Auckland Property Investors Association. The format reflects the monthly national report but provides commentary and charts specifically to the Auckland region.

The April 2012 Auckland Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the Auckland property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of April. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 98% of all property movements in the Auckland market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the Auckland Property Report – April 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.2MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – April 2012

The Auckland property market continues to drive ahead, even as the remainder of the country sees some re-balancing of the market. The market is firmly in the seller’s camp and this is evident by the pressure of constrained inventory which continues to hold at levels well below long term average and a year ago. In fact the levels are the lowest seen since the start of the property market slow-up in 2007.

Sales of property remain strong with the 2,806 properties sold in March across the region, this is up 18% as compared to the prior year, but was very slightly down from February on a seasonally adjusted basis by 1%. This level of demand has driven the asking price higher as sellers read the market signals and recongise the potential for a stronger selling price than a year ago.

The weakness of listings remains of concern, the 3,159 new properties coming onto the market in April were down 5% on a year ago and 14% down on February on a seasonally adjusted basis.

The next 3 month traditionally represent a quieter time for new listings as sellers feel the summer peak appeal period has passed, this is however not the case when it comes to demand from buyers who remain active through this winter period, the key will be if astute sellers recognize this and capitalize on what appears to be sustained demand to seek the best outcome for their property sale.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price for listings in April rose again to a new record level of $568,820 up 1.7% on the March level and up 2.5% from April last year. Auckland asking prices are second only to the Queenstown region which is nudging the $600,000 asking price mark at $595,766 in April.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in April fell significantly with a total of 3,159. This represents a fall of 5% as compared to April last year. On a seasonally adjusted basis the April figure was down 14% from March.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 42,272 new listings have come onto the market since May 2011 as compared to 41,850 in the prior 12 month period, a slight increase of just 1%. This compares to sales up 22% on the same 12 month comparable basis

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of April as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis at 10,941 was down 1% as compared to March. A year ago the inventory totaled 12,001.

As measured in weeks of equivalent sales the April level of 21.7 remained the same as March. The long term average for Auckland is 33 weeks and a year ago the level was 28 weeks.

Supplemental data

Property Sales

Property sales over the past 5 years in Auckland have gone through some significant shifts as the chart shows. There have been 2 periods with growth, and 2 periods of decline. Actual sales at this time (seasonally adjusted are at the highest level since the market suffered the significant decline between 2007 and 2008. This current period of growth in sales started in October 2010 and represents a 76% increase from that time.

Sales Price

The Stratified mean sales price (REINZ) for property in Auckland has gone through a sustained recovery over the past year and is now at a new high of $516,700. This represents a 1.3% increase from the prior high of July 2007. The chart very clearly reflects the impact of the price decline through the period of 2007 to 2009 resulting in a 14.6% adjustment in Auckland property prices.

Tags: asking price, Auckland, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, median price, Property prices, Property report, property-sales, REINZ

NZ Property Report – April 2012

Posted on: May 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The April 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of April. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 96% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – April 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.2MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – April 2012

April did not witness a flood of listings as might have been expected given the signals which have been flashing for some months now in the media that the property market is alert and very much alive; more so in the main centers of the country. Instead levels of listings were nearly identical to April last year.

This however, did not have the expected downward pressure on inventory of unsold houses on the market; this was due to the fact that whilst property sales are strong the latest month’s data for March did not show a seasonally adjusted increase.

This indicates that the market would appear not to be diving headlong into a property bubble, but rather is seeing steady turnover and pragmatic buying and selling in the main.

This behavoural change is supported by the asking price trend which in both seasonally adjusted and normal data eased slightly from recent consecutive new highs. This would support the view that the market is balancing buyers demand with sellers expectation well. Clearly there are pockets of the market where there is not quite this degree of balance, Auckland for example continues to feel the impact of listings in short supply with a new record high asking price, the 3rd in the past 8 months.

The next 3 months are traditionally a quieter time for the market with lower listings ahead of the spring pick up in August, if property sales continue strongly it is likely that asking prices may well creep up further as demand flows through to vendor expectations.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price for listings in April eased slightly to $423,832 from the high in March of $429,865. This easing in the month was not universally representative of all regions with Auckland again pushing a new higher peak of asking price.

The trend as seen in the chart covering the last 3 years very clearly shows a continuing growth in asking price over the recent 12 months as compared to 2010/2011.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in April fell with a total of 10,174. This represents a seasonally adjusted 10% fall from March and is nearly identical to April last year.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 128,065 new listings have come onto the market since May 2011 as compared to 129,678 in the prior 12 month period, a fall of just 1.2%. This compares to sales which are up 18% on the same 12 month comparable basis

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of April (46,948) was up as compared to March (46,462) as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. This total includes houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market. With the rising rate of property sales the inventory on the market has seen a significant drop off over the past 6 months pushing it well below the long term average of 41 weeks of equivalent sales.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers eased slightly in April to $423,832.

Around the country the dominant trend was an easing of asking prices with 11 of the 19 regions reporting falls, ranging from just 0.2% in Gisborne to a massive 12.8% in Wiararapa. There were 5 regions where the asking price showed a fall of greater than 5% – Waikato, Nelson, Southland, Marlborough as well as Wairarapa.

In contrast there were some strong growth in asking price with Hawkes Bay and West Coast reporting prices up 14.1% and 5.1% respectively.

Two regions – Auckland and Hawkes Bay reported new record levels of asking prices, in the case of the Hawkes Bay the prior high was last seen way back in 2007 whereas Auckland’s prior high was only 2 months ago.

Regional Summary – Listings

Listings volumes coming onto the market in April matched last April with 10 of the 19 regions seeing less than the same volumes in April last year. Significantly lower volumes were seen in Gisborne (-63%) and Central Otago / Queenstown (-48%), with Coromandel, Central North Island and Nelson all seeing volumes of greater than 20% below last April.

In contrast new listings flowed onto the market across Marlborough, Northland, Hawkes Bay, West Coast and Taranaki with volumes of new listings in all of these regions over 25% up on prior year.

The overall picture from this regional view of listings certainly backs up the position of the market rebalancing in terms of listings.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market eased slightly in April having reached a 4 year low in March.

Across the country the regions showed some rebalancing with the overall trend to a sellers’ market dominating the majority of regions.

There are still 6 regions highlighted in dark blue on the adjacent chart where the market is firmly in the sellers’ domain, this is one less than last month with Marlborough easing the pressure with a stronger flow of new listings.

In contrast there are this month 5 regions where buyers have the upper hand (dark green in the adjacent chart) – 2 more than last month. These additions are Coromandel and Taranaki, this again is the result of stronger flow of new listings.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings fell significantly in April after witnessing strong rises in February and March. A total of 835 listings came onto the market, down 20% year-on-year and down 28% as compared to March. The truncated mean asking price for these listings rose 3% as compared to the recent 3 month average to $655,009 – taking the level to another record high in asking price, surpassing the peak attained over the last 2 months. Across the regions, four reached new asking price highs – West Coast, Canterbury, Southland and Marlborough.

Across the country, listings were weak with just 6 regions reporting year-on-year growth in listings. In contrast lifestyle listings in the Hawkes Bay hit a new record high with 100 listings coming onto the market in April.

Apartments

Listings for apartments fell in April with just 398 being brought to the market, on a year-on-year basis listings were down 12%. The truncated mean asking price of new listings rose to $384,861 in April from $366,288 in March, representing a 4% year-on-year decrease but up 3% on the recent 3 month average.

The Auckland apartment market followed the national trend with 252 new listings coming onto the market, down 20% from March and also down 12% from April last year. The truncated mean asking price of new listings rose to $359,196 from $338,046 in March representing a 3% rise on the prior 3 months.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 10,174 new listings in the month of April, a total of 145 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for April 2011 can be downloaded here (1.2MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data tables with full data back to 2007 in both actual and seasonally adjusted form is accessible on this freely available spreadsheet hosted on Google Docs enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for May 2012 will be published on this website on Friday 1st June 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, Auckland, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, median price, Property report, property-sales, REINZ

NZ Property Report – March 2012

Posted on: April 3rd, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The March 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of March. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 96% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – March 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.2MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – March 2012

The message coming from the property market is that buyers are out and about and keen to get into the market, whether they are first-time buyers, mid-life stage buyers or even investors. Their eagerness to buy matched to availability of attractive financial support is however not being met with a consistent and sufficient supply of new listings. This scenario continues to drive this sellers’ market, where it is clear those homeowners who are putting their property on the market are expecting to see a higher sale price as flagged by this new record level of asking price in March.

Property sales are strong – 6,168 properties sold in February up 37% on a year ago (exclude the unique circumstances of the Christchurch earthquake and sales are still up 30%), and yet listings flow is not matching with just a 8% year-on-year growth, this is why the inventory supply of property on the market as measured by rate of sale has fallen 31% in the past year.

The next 3 months will be crucial as property sales traditionally remain strong through the Autumn, and without the ability of the market to be re-supplied with new listings the outcome could be further rises in asking price and sale price or more significantly a stalling of the market as buyers become wary of a market getting out of reach of the majority of buyers.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price for listings in March rose again to a new record level of $429,865 up $3,300 from February. This pushes the asking price up to another new high. The trend as seen in the chart covering the last 3 years very clearly shows an accelerating growth in asking price over the recent 12 months as compared to 2010/2011.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in March fell slightly with a total of 13,265. This represents a seasonally adjusted fall of just less than 1% from February and is up just 8% as compared to March last year.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 128,072 new listings have come onto the market since April 2011 as compared to 131,722 in the prior 12 month period, a fall of 2.8%. This compares to sales up 15% on the same 12 month comparable basis

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of March (46,411) was down as compared to February (47,030) as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. This total includes houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market. With the rising rate of property sales the inventory on the market has seen a significant drop off over the past 6 months pushing it well below the long term average of 41 weeks of equivalent sales.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers rose again in March to set a new high of $429,865.

Around the country the regions of Waikato and Canterbury recorded new record highs; in the case of Waikato the previous high was in December 2007, whilst Canterbury only posted it high last month. Across the country overall, 12 regions recorded asking prices up on prior month on a seasonally adjusted basis with big rises in Northland, Wairarapa and Nelson.

There were however, despite the record national asking price level some significant falls; most noticeable of which was Wellington, posting a 5.9% month-on-month seasonally adjusted fall to $423,554. This also represents a 5% fall on a year-on-year basis showing some weakness in the Capital city. The other notable regions recording falls were Gisborne and Central North Island.

Regional Summary – Listings

The general perspective of new listings coming onto the market as seen in the adjacent chart is that the majority of regions (15 of 19) are seeing a greater supply than a year ago. This is the case when seen in isolation, but the fact is that the rate of increase in the supply side of the market is not keeping pace with the sales side and this is resulting in the low level of inventory of properties on the market.

Strong levels of new listings in the Marlborough, West Coast, Central Otago / Queenstown are failing to arrest what are very low levels of inventory in these regions whilst the most at-risk regions (those experiencing low existing inventory and low listings growth) are Waikato and Canterbury, the former of which actually saw a fall in new listings despite the low inventory.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market tightened significantly again in March falling to 32.4 weeks of equivalent sales from 36.0 weeks on a seasonally adjusted basis.

Whilst the trend over the first 2 months of the new year has been to see some balance of inventory-to-demand the current picture as represented in the adjacent chart shows a market facing tightness in availability of listings with 7 of the 19 regions (dark blue) so low in inventory that they are very clearly providing sellers with the ultimate power. Coupled with these 7 regions, are a further 6 (light blue) where inventories are below long term average and show strong signs of a sellers’ market.

By contrast there are only 3 regions (Gisborne, Wairarapa and Otago) where the inventory levels are above long term average providing buyers with the advantage. Contrast this with the same view of the market 12 months ago and there was not one region where inventory was at or below the long term average.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings rose sharply in March reflecting the general property market. A total of 1,048 Lifestyle property listings rose again in March after a strong rise in February. A total of 1,154 listings came onto the market, up 5% year-on-year and up 10% as compared to February. The truncated mean asking price for these listings rose 7% as compared to the recent 3 month average to $644,860 – taking the level to another record high in asking price, surpassing the peak attained last month.

Across the country, strong growth in listings were seen in Southland, Taranaki, Bay of Plenty, Marlborough and the Manawatu all posting rises of over 20% year-on-year.

Apartments

Listings for apartments slipped slightly between February and March with 527 being brought to the market, on a year-on-year basis listings were down 2%. The truncated mean asking price of new listings fell from $402,278 in February to $366,288 in March, representing a 3% year-on-year decrease and down 4% on the recent 3 month average.

The Auckland apartment market followed the national trend with 314 new listings coming onto the market, down 5% from February and also down 5% from March last year. The truncated mean asking price of new listings also fell to $338,046 from $390,021 in February representing a 5% decrease on the prior 3 months.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 13,265 new listings in the month of March, a total of 377 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for March 2011 can be downloaded here (1.2MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for April 2012 will be published on this website on Tuesday 1st May 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, median price, Property prices, Property report

NZ Property Report – February 2012

Posted on: March 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The February 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of February. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 95% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – February 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.5MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – February 2012

The property market across the country in aggregate has become more active in the past 9 months, in January alone sales were up 25% on a year ago and the final 3 months of 2011 saw sales up 22%. With this increasing demand the market as reflected from the supply side has been slow to respond, that is until February when listings were seen to come onto the market in a strong surge.

In absolute terms the level of new listings at 13,459 is up 18% on February last year and 14% up on a seasonally adjusted basis from January. This new rush of listings comes with a higher price expectation of sellers, eager to capitalize on what they see as a strong property market, the test will come as to whether these price expectations result in higher selling prices or if the level of buyer demand is prepared to meet these expectations. As has been noted before, this pressure in the market caused by a shortage of listing is very focused in the main cities with provincial regions still not witnessing anything like the level of buyer demand or activity as witnessed in the cities.

This new surge of listings appears in the main to be easing some of the pressure as measured by inventory levels with easing in those areas of the country feeling the shortage most significantly in recent months providing some comfort for those buyers who are eagerly waiting for the right house to come to market.

Asking Price

The seasonally adjusted truncated mean asking price of $426,575 for all new listings in February rose by 2.1% from January. This is a new record level for asking price up from the prior peak of $425,936 reached in October last year. The trend as seen in the chart covering the last 3 years shows a degree of accelerated growth in asking price over the recent 12 months as compared to 2010.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in February rose sharply with a total of 13,459 new listings coming onto the market. This represents a seasonally adjusted rise of 13.5% from January and is up 18.1% as compared to February last year.

On a 12 month moving average basis a total of 127,054 new listings have come onto the market since March 2011 as compared to 133,883 in the prior 12 month period, a fall of 5.1%.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of February (47,058) was up marginally as compared to January (46,976) as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. This total includes houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market. However as a function of the increasing level of sales over the past 6 months, the inventory as measured in weeks of equivalent sales has fallen again from 36.4 weeks in January to 36.0 weeks in February. This compares to an inventory in February last year of 48.7 weeks, a fall of 26% in a year.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers rose significantly to a new high of $426,575 in February.

Following the new record high for the national figure of asking price, both Canterbury and the Central North Island posted record highs. In the case of the Central North Island this is the highest asking price since October 2008, for Canterbury the pressure of listings shortages continues to put pressure on asking price.

Around the rest of the country 11 regions showed rises with Nelson the largest rise of 15.3% as compared to prior month on a seasonally adjusted basis. A total of 8 regions reported seasonally adjusted falls with the West Coast and Taranaki posting large falls of 8.4% and 7.3% respectively.

As has been seen in recent months the main three metro centers of Auckland, Wellington and Canterbury reported continuing rises in asking price.

Regional Summary – Listings

The general picture across the country for February was for a significant rise in new listings. Only one region, the Coromandel reported lower number of listings in February this year as compared to last year – down 19%. The remaining 18 regions reported rises of single digits right up to a massive 51% rise in Marlborough and 55% in Gisborne, with many regions reporting 30+% increases.

The tightest markets of the past 6 months being the major 3 cities saw some degree of pressure easing on limited supply as Canterbury saw a 31% rise with over 1,500 listings, however Auckland saw only a 16% rise and Wellington 10% rise. These increases do not match the year-on-year increase in sales which in January for Auckland was 28% and Wellington 18%.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market tightened again in February marginally slipping down to 36.0 weeks of equivalent sales from 36.4 weeks on a seasonally adjusted basis.

The change which has been witnessed over the past month has been to a more balanced market in many regions. As judged by the relative inventory to long term average, 7 regions are identified as being sellers markets with just 4 being buyers markets, leaving the remaining 8 as balanced markets favouring neither one party over the other.

The most extreme market pressure continues to be felt in the Canterbury and Auckland markets, but also in the Waikato and the West Coast, all of which are seeing levels of inventory when judged on rate of sale basis well below long term average. A noticeable change in February was the fact that in all 3 major cities the actual inventory level in weeks of equivalent sales and physical inventory did rise thereby showing that the market is responding the demand and shortage of supply.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings rose sharply in February reflecting the general property market. A total of 1,048 listings came onto the market, up 12% year-on-year and up 65% as compared to January. The truncated mean asking price for these listings rose by 10% as compared to the recent 3 month average to $643,647 – a new record high in asking price, surpassing the last peak of Feb 2009 at $633,811.

Across the country, four regions also recorded new peak asking price – Waikato, Hawkes Bay, West Coast and Canterbury.

Apartments

Listings for apartments rose sharply in February with 538 being brought to the market, a rise of 88% as compared to January and 13% up on February last year. The truncated means asking price rose significantly from $349,736 in January to $402,278 in February, a 10% year-on-year increase and up 8% on the recent 3 month average.

The Auckland apartment market also witnessed a strong month with 329 new listings coming onto the market, up 84% from the very low level of January and up just 2% on February last year. The truncated mean asking price rose sharply to $390,021 from $314,757 in January representing a 20% year-on-year increase and a 14% increase on the prior 3 months.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 13,459 new listings in the month of November, a total of 730 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for February 2012 can be downloaded here (1.5MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for March 2012 will be published on this website on Sunday 1st April 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, Property report

NZ Property Report for January 2012 – video interview

Posted on: February 1st, 2012 | Posted in NZ Property Report

To complement the full NZ Property Report for January we have from this month started a regular interview with Bernard Hickey of Interest.co.nz covering all the key salient points of the report. This video format provides what we hope will be an easily consumed summary of the report with a professional and authoritative commentator of the market in Bernard.

The video is provided for viewing here and is also featured in a detailed summary of the NZ Property Report on Interest.co.nz.

NZ Property Report – January 2012

Posted on: February 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The January 2012 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of January. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 95% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – January 2012 is published below and is available for download (1.5MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – January 2012

The new calendar year starts with low levels of inventory of properties for sale on the market which is matched by a sluggish flow of new listings, which is then meeting a rising demand in the rate of sale which is up 22% for the past 3m months as compared to the same period last year. This scenario is most extreme in the 3 key regions of Auckland, Wellington and Canterbury which this rise in sales has driven the inventory levels to the lowest levels of the past 4 years – spanning a period when the property market has seen very lackluster activity.

Historically the supply side of the property market tends to lag the demand side as measured by sales and it is likely that the coming two months of February and March will see heightened activity in new listings as the property market hits the peak of activity over these summer months.

The data for this month’s report and going forward all future reports reflects the seasonally adjusted data for asking price expectation and inventory. The seasonal adjusted data better presents the true trends in these key metrics as it removes the inherent seasonality of the property market. The computation of this seasonally adjusted data is provided with the assistance of the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research (NZIER) and uses a X12 ARIMA methodology to calculate seasonally adjusted data.

Asking Price

The truncated mean asking price of $417,740 for all new listings in January now calculated on a seasonally adjusted basis fell 0.5% from December. The past 3 months has seen a progressive easing from the peak in October of $425,936 – an adjustment of 2%.

Despite this recent fall the long term trend is showing an increasing asking price albeit at a rate of just 1% per year.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in January fell on a seasonally adjusted basis by a significant 12%. A total of 8,542 new listings came onto the market representing a very modest 3% year-on-year rise.

The continuing trend of the past 12 months is to a lower level of new listings – the past 12 months has seen just under 125,000 new listing as compared to 137,000 in the prior 12 month period.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of January was up slightly as compared to December at 46,967 as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis. This total includes houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market. However as the rate of sale has picked up over the past 3 months leading up to the end of 2011, the inventory as measured in weeks of equivalent sales has fallen from 37.5 weeks in December to 36.4 weeks in January

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national (seasonally adjusted) truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers eased again in January to $417,740.

Despite this national easing in asking price there were just 5 regions across the country that reported a fall in seasonally adjusted asking price. Most noticeable was the Central Otago/Queenstown Lakes and Nelson region which both showed double digit falls. Against this backdrop all of the price rises were of a smaller scale and reflect in the other 14 regions.

Auckland, the largest region of the country saw asking price fall by 1% to $540,187 – a consecutive 3 month fall since the peak of October 2011 at $560,327. Wellington asking price rose 2.9% to $444,900 and Canterbury up 0.6% to $374,123 – this latest asking price is fast approaching the peak of $374,952 last seen in January 2008.

Regional Summary – Listings

New listings movement across the country between December and January was in most regions fairly modest. There were 6 regions from the 19 that showed falls with Gisborne and the Wairarapa showing the biggest falls 21% and 20% respectively. Both of these regions have been experiencing high levels of inventory and this market reaction may well edge them back towards a more balanced market.

In contrast across the 13 regions that saw increases most saw modest single digit growths.

The Taranaki and Central Otago/ Queenstown Lakes both showed significant double digit growth in listings – the latter being a region which is beginning to see a buyers’ market emerging as inventory continues to rise.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market tightened again in January slipping down to 36 weeks of equivalent sales nationally. These figures now reflect seasonally adjusted data.

The majority of regions still favour sellers – 9 of the 19 are seen as sellers markets, with just 3 regions being categorized as buyers markets – Gisborne, Wairarapa and Central Otago/Queenstown Lakes .

The physical inventory of property on the market as measured on a seasonally adjusted basis is the lowest for the month of January since 2007 and as such represents a clear view of the tightness of the market. The market for the coming months will be very interesting to watch as transaction levels growing as the market hits the peak period of February and March.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings in January at 634 listings was the second lowest month of the past 5 years – only marginally beaten by July of last year with 628. This level of new listings represented a 25% fall from December and a 13% fall from January last year. On a seasonally adjusted basis listings recorded a 34% decline from December.

The truncated mean asking price for lifestyle properties rose 13% in the month of January to $620,831 and represented a 15% year on year growth. Peak prices were seen in both Canterbury ($661,237) and the West Coast ($553,375).

Apartments

New listings for apartments fell to their lowest level in the past 5 years in January that despite a record low in December. Just 286 apartments coming onto the market, this reflected a 21% year on year fall. The truncated mean asking price of $349,736 was down 3% from January last year and 12% down on December.

The Auckland market which dominates the apartment market saw a record low level of new apartment listings with just 179 new listings in January which was down 9% on prior month and down 25% down on last year. The asking price was $314,757 which was down 8% on last year and 13% down from December.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

With the largest database of properties for sale in NZ, realestate.co.nz is uniquely placed to immediately identify any changes in the marketplace. The realestate.co.nz NZ Property Report is compiled from new listings coming onto the market from the more than 1,000 licensed real estate offices across NZ, representing more than 95% of all offices.

In analysing the details of the 8,542 new listings in the month of November, a total of 292 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Seasonally adjustment

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for January 2011 can be downloaded here (1.5MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for February 2012 will be published on this website on Thursday1st March 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, Property prices, Property report, property-sales

NZ Property Report – December 2011

Posted on: January 1st, 2012 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The December 2011 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of December. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 95% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – December 2011 is published below and is available for download (1.5MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – December 2011

The property market saw a further tightening of supply in December, more especially in the 3 major cities where the market remains very firmly as a sellers market. In overall terms the number of new listings coming onto the market in December was considerably lower than expected given the surge in November. This lower level means that inventory levels of property on the market slipped again to remain below the long term average. In December with 47,557 properties on the market the current rate of sale would see these all sell in just over 36 weeks as against the long term average of 41 weeks. This national level has remained below the average for 6 months in a row and with strong sales in November and early December it is anticipated that this will continue into the new year.

The country overall is still balanced between a buyers and a sellers market with the provincial areas seeing less tightness in new listings and available inventory of property on the market.

Asking Price

The truncated mean asking price of $420,109 for all new listings in December eased slightly again from the peak in October of $434,161. On a seasonally adjusted basis the asking price actually rose 0.4%.

The long term trend as seen in the chart has been a steady increase in asking price over the past 3 years – the seasonal trend each year tends to see asking prices rise through from mid winter to October before falling back.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in December fell on a seasonally adjusted basis by 2%. A total of 8,732 new listings came onto the market representing a 2% year-on-year fall.

For the calendar year of 2011 a total of 124,748 new listings came onto the market as compared to 138,789 for calendar year 2010 – a fall of 10%. By comparison the prior years stats were 2007: 177,529; 2008: 163,488; 2009: 135,416. So as compared to the peak of the market on 2007 listings are down 30%.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of December slipped lower in somewhat of an unexpected trend. At the end of the month there were 47,557 houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market down from the 48,647 in November and down significantly from 53,077 a year ago. This current level of inventory represents 36.7 weeks of equivalent sales.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers eased again in November to $420,109. This price trend has been seen for each of the past 4 years as rising asking prices begin to ease as the summer approaches.

Across the 19 regions the view is mixed with 10 regions showing an increase in asking prices as measured against the recent 3 month average. There were 4 regions showing significant rises n asking prices of over 5% – Central North Island, Nelson, Central Otago / Queenstown Lakes and West Coast.

Amongst the 9 regions showing a fall in asking price there were 6 regions where the falls were modest (between 1% and 5%) – Coromandel, Hawkes Bay, Wellington, Canterbury, Otago and Southland. The largest fall in asking price in the month was in the Wairarapa which saw asking price fall by 11% vs. December last year.

Regional Summary – Listings

New listings fell across most of the country in December with just 6 of the 19 regions seeing any increase on a year-on-year basis. The biggest falls was seen in the Wairarapa and the Coromandel which was down 26% with just 204 new listings, this follows a 29% year-on-year decline in November.

Contrasting these regions were the Central North Island reporting 35% increase, The other regions reporting increases all were below 20% increase indicating the low levels of new listings coming onto the market over recent months as compared to prior years.

The remainder of the country seems to reflect a balance with 3 regions reporting barely changed levels of new listings which would indicate a balance between buyers and sellers.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market eased slightly this month following a fall first seen last month. The expectations from October was to have seen some rise over the summer but with keen buying activity to the rise in new listings in November did not result in building inventory – quite the reverse.

Across the country there were a total of 9 regions where the advantage is to sellers. Of these the 7 regions of Auckland, Manawatu/Wanganui, Canterbury, West Coast, Central North Island and the Waikato remain very much in strong sellers markets.

There are however still 5 regions (Central Otago / Queenstown Lakes, Wairarapa, Southland, Taranaki and Gisborne) were the market is certainly favouring buyers with high levels of inventory set against long term average.

The market is now firmly in the peak summer season and with the more balanced market in terms of inventory of unsold properties on the market the options seem more open for both active buyers and sellers.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings fell back in December with 845 listings in the month, this represented a 1.5% seasonally adjusted fall and was down 9% on the same month last year. The truncated mean asking price at $550,245 was up 2% from last year but down 8% down on the recent 3 month average.

Across the country strength in new listings was seen in Otago (33, up 120% Yr. on Yr.) and the West Coast (25, up 108% Yr. on Yr.). Whilst the Bay of Plenty, Hawkes Bay and Gisborne all saw year on year falls of over 30%.

Apartments

New listings for apartments fell to their lowest level in the past 4 years in December with just 346 apartments coming onto the market, this reflected a 35% from November and a 23% fall on last year. The truncated mean asking price of $396,501 was up 7% from prior month, but down 14% as compared to last year.

The Auckland market which dominates the apartment market saw a record low level of new apartment listings with just 196 new listings in December which was down 44% on prior month and down 27% down on last year. The asking price was $360,522 which was down 25% on last year but 2% up from November.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 8,732 new listings in the month of November, a total of 84 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for December 2011 can be downloaded here (1.5MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for January 2012 will be published on this website on Wednesday 1st February 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, Auckland, inventory, inventory of property on the market, inventory of unsold houses, listings, median price, Property prices, Property report

NZ Property Report – November 2011

Posted on: December 1st, 2011 | Posted in Featured, NZ Property Report

The November 2011 NZ Property Report published by Realestate.co.nz provides an insight into the state of the New Zealand property market as measured by the supply side of the property market over the month of November. The key measures of the market analysed in the report are the number of new listings, the asking price expectation for those new listings and the level of inventory of unsold houses on the market at this time. The report is compiled from data captured by the website and represents close to 95% of all property movements in the NZ market as managed by licensed real estate agents.

A full print version of the NZ Property Report – November 2011 is published below and is available for download (1.5MB) and distribution.

Summary of the market – November 2011

The property market is now firmly in the active Summer season with a strong surge of new listings coming onto the market to provide variety for the prospective buyers who have certainly been more active over the winter and spring period of this year. This current level of activity is likely to result in full calendar year sales in excess of 60,000. This would be up 7% on the prior year; however this level of sales is far below the peak of the property market (now a somewhat distant memory) of 2004 when in excess of 120,000 properties were sold in that year.

The slightly lower level of listings in October are now judged to have been influenced by the Rugby World Cup with sellers possibly hesitant to list at that time preferring to wait until the event was over before marketing their properties. It is still though noticeable the extent to which this year has seen a much lower level of new listings than 2010, so far this year 116,016 new listings have been brought to market 11% lower than last year.

With this new flow of listings has come what can be considered to be a confident position by sellers on asking price; which whilst slipping slightly in the month continues to show a slow but steady increase over the past few years. This confidence on the part of sellers is certainly supported by the rate of sale of property which is being shared by real estate agents in their daily contact with the public, and can also be seen in traffic to online listing sites which has seen an aggregated increase this year of 6% with over 187,000 daily visitor sessions across all sites (Nielsen Online).

Asking Price

The truncated mean asking price of $425,956 for all new listings in November eased slightly from the peak in October of $434,161. On a seasonally adjusted basis the asking price fell 2% indicating that whilst expectations are rising the rate of increase is not as high as seasonal factors would expect.

New Listings

The level of new listings coming onto the market in November rose on a seasonally adjusted basis by 17%. A total of 13,369 new listings came onto the market representing a 3% year-on-year rise.

On a 12 month moving total basis the number of new listings in the past year totals 124,412 as compared 140,214 for the same period a year ago – a fall of 11%.

Inventory

The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of November turned down slightly in what was a somewhat unexpected trend. At the end of the month there were 48,647 houses, apartments and lifestyle properties on the market barely up from 46,597 in October and down from 54,365 a year ago. This current level of inventory represents 38.1 weeks of equivalent sales.

Regional Summary – Asking price expectations

The national truncated mean asking price expectation among sellers eased slightly in November to $425,956. This price trend has been seen for each of the past 4 years as rising asking prices begin to ease as the summer approaches.

Across the 19 regions the view is generally of increasing prices with 12 regions reporting increases as measured against the recent 3 month average. There were 3 regions with rises of over 5% – Hawkes Bay, Nelson and the West Coast, the latter of these reporting a new record high up 25% over the prior year to $315,993.

Amongst the 7 regions showing a fall in asking price there were 4 regions where the fall was over 5% – Northland, Gisborne, Manawatu / Wanganui and Southland. The largest of these falls was in Gisborne which saw asking price fall by 29% vs. November last year, this level at $260,189 is approaching a record low last seen in early 2009.

Regional Summary – Listings

New listings rose across most of the country in November with just 5 of the 19 regions seeing falls in listings of greater than 5%. The biggest fall was in the Coromandel which was down 29% with just 247 new listings, this compares with levels of over 400 in prior years.

Contrasting these regions were Nelson reporting 24% increase, Northland with a 46% increase and the Central North Island with an enormous 120% increase – this latter region has seen a consistently low level of new listings this year. In the first 10 months of this year only 1,284 listings came onto the market, whilst 296 new listing hit the market in the single month of November.

The remainder of the country seems to reflect a balance with 6 regions reporting barely changed levels of new listings which would indicate a balance between buyers and sellers.

Regional Summary – Inventory

The inventory of unsold homes on the market eased slightly this month having seen a slight upturn in October; given the rise in new listings this would indicate a strong rate of sale.

Across the country there were a total of 8 regions where the advantage is to sellers. Of these the 5 regions of Auckland, Manawatu/Wanganui, Canterbury, West Coast and the Waikato remain very much in strong sellers markets. If anything the past month has seen a degree of rebalancing of the market overall in all but these extreme market-condition-affected regions.

There are however still 5 regions (Marlborough, Wairarapa, Southland, Taranaki and Gisborne) were the market is certainly favouring buyers with high levels of inventory set against long term average.

Lifestyle

Lifestyle property listings shot up in November with 1,133 listings in the month, this represented a 15% seasonally adjusted increase but was down 5% on the same month last year. The truncated mean asking price at $574,507 was up 3% from last year but down 3% down on the recent 3 month average.

Across the country strength in new listings was seen in Northland (125, up 67% Yr. on Yr.) and the Waikato (120, up 13% Yr. on Yr.). Whilst the Bay of Plenty, Hawkes Bay and Wellington all saw year on year falls of over 25%.

Apartments

New listings for apartments picked up in November with 535 apartments coming onto the market up 20% from October but 10% down on last year. The truncated mean asking price of $370,532 was up 2% from prior month and in line with last year.

The Auckland market which dominates the apartment market saw a stronger performance with 350 new listings which was 25% up on prior month and just 1.4% down on last year. The asking price was $352,407 which was up nearly 15% on last year and 2% up from October.

Notes:

Truncated mean

The truncated mean used in this report removes the upper 10% and the lower 10% of listings in each data set. An average or mean of the balance of listings is then calculated.

Methodology

In analysing the details of the 13,369 new listings in the month of November, a total of 138 listings have been excluded due to anomalies. The land area of the property defines the categorisation of Lifestyle property. The criterion is a property having in excess of 0.3 hectares and being situated outside metropolitan areas.

Background to Realestate.co.nz

The business operates a portfolio of websites all focused to specialist sectors of the real estate market:

The full NZ Property Report for November 2011 can be downloaded here (1.5MB pdf document). Additionally the raw data is accessible here as an Excel spreadsheet enabling anyone to analyse the raw data and establish any trends or observations.

Usage rights are governed under attribution to the source of the data being Realestate.co.nz. The next NZ Property Report for December 2011 will be published on this website on Sunday 1st January 2012 at 10am.

Tags: asking price, inventory of unsold houses, listings, Property prices, Property report

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