A slowdown from the first half of the year is expected when economic growth figures for the September quarter come out on Thursday.

Auckland City house values will shortly top the market peak of 2007 in real terms as a red-hot property market pushes up prices.

House sale volumes have hit a five-year high in the wake of booming prices, with a Real Estate Institute report showing sales up 24 per cent in a year.

Auckland builder George Levick expects tougher new seismic standards to be a big boost to the construction sector.

The Government's moves to permanently abolish tree protection rules for those not already named on district plans will be further strengthened, an expert says.

Auckland now has 13 suburbs with an average house value of $1 million or more, property figures released to the Herald show.

Roofs are going on New Zealand's biggest, most expensive new residential development, which could be finished next summer.

Waiheke Island could be the last place in Auckland where first home buyers can still afford the quarter acre dream.

The average selling price for homes in the Auckland market rose by 1.5 per cent last month, says the region's biggest real estate agency Barfoot and Thompson.

A scheme has been launched to encourage Aucklanders to buy big new planned Christchurch houses for $640,000, as a financial watchdog reminds investors.

Auckland real estate asking prices fell 2 per cent last month even as longer-term sale prices continued to soar, according to Realestate.co.nz.

The two faces of the North Island property market are reflected in new figures out today that show Auckland prices still largely surging.

The powers that be within the Super City are floating an idea that would give some flesh to all those slogans about liveable, transformational and world class.

A council has gone to extreme lengths to create safer neighbourhoods by preventing home owners from building garages ahead of the house, and forcing more living on to the front yard with little privacy.

Just over four months ago, printer Layton Armstrong and vet Charmaine Abraham began house-hunting in the Otahuhu/Mt Wellington area, looking at places going for about $400,000.

A real estate agent is alleged to be the central link in a drug-dealing enterprise which supplied methamphetamine throughout the country.

Editorial: In one swoop, all houses built before World War II will be deemed to have special merit. Never mind that in any period a mixture of good, average and awful homes are built.

The Auckland Council is considering a ban on demolishing tens of thousands of heritage and character homes unless owners can prove they are beyond repair.

An Auckland developer says Chinese are using property as a ticket into this country because owning real estate increases immigration visa points.

Police and fire safety officers are investigating the cause of a blaze that destroyed an upmarket Auckland home, almost killing the owner.

Auckland currently has capacity for thousands of dwellings on existing greenfield land, writes Len Brown. "So the issue is clearly more than just land supply."