![Do-up dream slips from buyer](/pf/resources/images/placeholders/placeholder_l.png?d=795)
Do-up dream slips from buyer
Jason Rathgen is getting desperate - he sought pre-approval for a loan with a deposit of less than 20 per cent.
Jason Rathgen is getting desperate - he sought pre-approval for a loan with a deposit of less than 20 per cent.
A controversial proposal to allow developers to build unlimited density housing in much of suburban Auckland is set to be rejected by Auckland councillors this week.
Finance companies could make a comeback in the wake of the Reserve Bank's clampdown on low deposit lending by banks.
Experts say tighter mortgage lending rules will only a partially ease house prices, writes Jamie Gray.
The four homes made famous by The Block last year could be worth 10 per cent more than what they sold for in today's skyrocketing market, says a real estate agent who marketed one of the properties.
The widespread assumption that most first home buyers will be shut out of the housing market by the Reserve Bank's curbs on low-deposit home loans may be too swift.
Now that we know what the Reserve Bank is doing by way of curbs on low-deposit mortgage lending the question is whether it will work, writes Brian Fallow.
New loan restrictions mean the "poor middle-class" hoping to buy their first home will be left out in the cold as banks cherry pick their ideal customers.
New controls on mortgage lending, which increase the deposit required to secure a home, will shut more New Zealanders out of the market, economists say.
Ngati Whatua might develop up to 100 residences on its 4.2ha Wakakura block near Devonport.
Home insurance policies have been rewritten thanks to Canterbury quakes - and not in policy holder's favour.
"Each time there are flurries of outrage from groups of tenants facing a 21- year land rent review, my first thought is, what did they expect?" writes Brian Rudman.
A four-bedroom home in Epsom has sold for more than $1 million - or 82 per cent - above valuation.
Couple snag Morningside home, believing the number 4 put Chinese competition off.
The list makes for alarming reading - real estate agents forging signatures, bad-mouthing properties for sale and giving false or misleading information when they were under investigation.
The latest KiwiSaver changes to assist first-home buyers appears to be a small band-aid, compared with a capital gains tax, writes Peter Bromhead.
The Government fired another shot in its battle to control rising house prices yesterday, announcing law changes it says will curb charges levied by local authorities on developers for providing infrastructure such as roads and sewerage to new subdivision
New Zealand buildings including houses will increasingly be manufactured in bulk in factories and assembled on site, and the consenting process will have to change accordingly, says Building and Construction Minister Maurice Williamson.
The council has promised to cap rates rises at 10 per cent, but some confused residents have seen their bills leap by almost twice that.
Most first-home buyers will find the Government's new plan to ease their burden less compelling than Labour's plan to build 10,000 affordable houses.
It will be another two years before Auckland Council has a single direct debit system for rates, making life difficult for some ratepayers in the meantime.
House prices dipped last month, says the Real Estate Institute, but the number of properties changing hands was up more than 10 per cent from the month before.
Expectations that house prices will rise remain at very high levels last seen in 2003 at the outset of the mid-2000s boom.
House price inflation creates no new output and few jobs. It consigns young first-home buyers to a life of debt servitude, writes Peter Lyons.
Aucklanders' rates bills have arrived in letterboxes and the figures have come as a shock to some homeowers who have seen rises of 10 per cent.
A newborn baby and now for the first home - except things are not so straightforward in Auckland's heated property market.
Ali and Casey Williams are getting ready to sell their Westmere home before heading to France.
The creative juices must have been flowing when a fruit drink magnate's celebrated new house was on the drawing board.
A house was auctioned for more than $1 million just a day after being listed for sale - drawing an official warning about Auckland's pressure-cooker housing market.