Barfoot & Thompson has released its November sales data. Photo / supplied
Barfoot & Thompson has released its November sales data. Photo / supplied
Auckland and Northland unsold residential properties hit a 12-year high last month, with 5052 listed on the market by the city’s biggest agency but yet to find buyers.
Barfoot & Thompson’s average number of properties for sale during any one month last year was just 3353. In 2020 it was only 3759.
But the agency’s data now shows a swelling number of available listings at the end of the month.
The previous record was set in February 2011 when the agency had 6053 properties for sale. During that year it had more than 5000 listings at the end of March, April, May and November.
But in more buoyant times lately, the agency had fewer places to sell as demand soared partly due to historically low interest rates.
November’s median sales price fell 2.4 per cent from October’s $1,092,500 to $1,065,000.
“Property is selling, albeit at a level lower than at the same time last year,” said managing director Peter Thompson.
“What it demonstrates is vendors and buyers are reaching an agreement as to where prices are at.”
November’s median price fell 14.1 per cent on the peak median price recorded last November. The average $1,153,795 fell 9.8 per cent on the peak last December.
November’s average price increased from October by 1.5 per cent.
For sale signs outside a house in Auckland. Photo / ted Baghurst
“Buyer choice in Auckland has rarely been greater in recent times,” Thompson said today.
The average sales price in November was influenced by a return of buyers to the $2m and over categories and to sales in the under $750,000 price category.
Many of the buyers in the lower-price sector were first-time buyers, Thompson said.
“In November we sold 64 properties for more than $2m, 19 of them being for more than $3m. This is the highest number of homes valued at more than $3m we have sold in a month for six months,” he said.
The agency sold 125 homes for under $750,000, or 17.9 per cent of all the homes sold.
New listings for the month at 1577 were down significantly on those for November in the past few years.
The lifestyle and rural markets had their best month’s trading in four months but trading was modest compared with this time last year.
Interest in lifestyle properties around Pukekohe was strong with sales from $1m to $3m. Vendors were testing the market by selling via auction or tender rather than listed price, the agency said.
In the Far North, the main focus during the month was on coastal lifestyle and existing homes.
Today, OneRoof published its property report which said house prices fell an average of $90,000 in parts of New Zealand after a turbulent year.
That meant homeowners who bought at the height of the property boom in late 2021 could find themselves with mortgages larger than their home’s value, especially in Auckland and Wellington.
But there were also some positives: the price fall allowed more first-home buyers onto the property ladder.
The report noted the huge market shift during the year and highlighted some risks for homeowners.
James Wilson, head of valuations at Valocity, said the fall in prices this year was the largest since 2010, but had to be seen in context: the boom since Covid was one of the strongest New Zealand had experienced, with an average growth of 33 per cent nationally from early 2020 to early this year.
The Herald also today reported how the rise in prominence of building societies, finance companies and credit unions for mortgages may have peaked.
Non-bank lenders’ share of the mortgage market hovered at an 11-year high in each of the five months to October, according to new Reserve Bank data.
While non-bank lenders only accounted for 1.8 per cent of the country’s mortgage lending, this was still equivalent to $6.1b in October – 29 per cent more than last October.
The shift went from banks to non-banks but has now swung back to banks again.
