July 3, 2025 • 16 mins
Rates have increased across the country this week, with some cities better off than others.
Auckland Council has confirmed a 5.8 percent average residential rates increase, the same day Wellington’s council struck a 12 percent lift in rates.
Meanwhile, Gisborne residents face an average 9.95% rate increase, which equates to $400 or less for 80% of homeowners.
The increases have come at the same as council valuations in Auckland dropped by 9%.
But, what do lower CVs mean for your rates bill? And, what does it mean in the context of the wider property market?
Today on The Front Page, Opes Partners’ economist Ed McKnight is with us to bust some myths about valuations, rates, and the current state of house prices.
Follow The Front Page on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can read more about this and other stories in the New Zealand Herald, online at nzherald.co.nz, or tune in to news bulletins across the NZME network.
Host: Chelsea Daniels
Sound Engineer/Producer: Richard Martin
Producer: Ethan Sills
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hilda.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald. Rates have
increased across the country this week, with some cities better
off than others. Auckland Council has confirmed a five point
eight percent average residential rates increase, the same day that
(00:30):
Wellington's council struck a twelve percent lift in their rates. Meanwhile,
Gisbon residents face an average nine point ninety five percent
rate increase, which equates to about four hundred dollars or
less for eighty percent of homeowners there, and the increases
have come at the same time as council valuations in
(00:50):
Auckland dropped by nine percent. But what do lower cvs
mean for your rates bill and what does it mean
in the context of the wider property market Today? On
the front Page, opuh's partner's economist Ed McKnight is with
us to bust some myths about valuations, rates and the
(01:11):
current state of the housing market. Ed, we've seen a
variety in rates increases around the country, which mostly all
came in effect at the start of the month. What
are some of the trends that you've seen this year.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Well, the most interesting thing is some areas aren't seeing
massive rates increases, like place like Wanganu we are only
up two point two percent. Auckland that are actually below
average as well, up about five point eight percent. But
some council areas have really ramped up rates. Down on
the West Coast, we've seen regional rates go up over
twenty five percent. My understanding is that Hastings Napier are
(01:54):
all up over twenty percent as well. Pretty easy to
understand why, given that they've had some really big issues
with weather related events recently. But even areas like Kluther
District way down South and Otago they have seen massive
rates increases there too.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
And the rates increase that's come for Auckland is a
few weeks after homeowners received their council valuations. Now what
is this CV and what does it mean for your
house price?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, it's real interesting. A lot of people are quite
surprised that they've got their new CV. Their house value
appears to drop, but they're still paying a higher rates bill.
And what you've got to understand is that your house
price doesn't necessarily impact the exact amount of rates that
you pay. It does, but kind of in a roundabout way.
So the way that it works is that Auckland Council
or any of the councils will say how much money
(02:46):
do we need to raise this year and spoiler alert,
it's more than last year, and the CV is used
to say, well, how much of a share should each
homeowner have to pay? Well, if your house is a
bit more expensive than somebody else's house, you probably have
more money, so you pay a higher share of those rates.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
So even though most.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
People's cvs have gone down, their house values have gone down,
what really matters is, well, how much has rules changed
compared to everyone else's. So if your house value didn't
go down by the average of about nine percent, then
you will pay a higher share of your rates of
the rates in total and get an above average rates increase.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Right, So I was doing some research and I came
across some common myths or assumptions online about rates and cvs.
One was that because property values have reduced, your rates
will reduce as well.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Is that right extically what we were just talking about.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
There's another myth that councils really want house prices to
go up because then they get to charge everybody more
and more rates. But if your house value goes up
or goes down by ten percent, that doesn't mean that
the council charges you ten percent more if your house
value in or charges your ten percent less because the
house value has gone down. It's all about what is
(04:04):
the share of rates that you pay, and the cvs
are just the mechanism to make sure that people who
have more money and can afford more expensive houses end
up paying a higher share.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Is that a bit of an old school assumption though,
just because you live in a real snazzy house that
you've presumably got more money to pay rates.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
I think it's probably quite a simple way about going
about it, because there are lots of different ways that
you could decide, well, who pays more, who pays less.
I think it's a pretty fair way to go about it. Personally,
I live in an above average house, and so I
pay and above average share. I have an above average
rates bill. I kind of think that's fair. Where it
(04:46):
does come a little bit unstuck, as if you're a retiree.
So let's say you bought a house for a packet
of raspberries back in nineteen eighties. Now your house value
might be way way way way more expensive. Now, that's
good because you've got some more equity. But if you're
a retiree, maybe your income's gone down. But there are
targeted packages of support, like you can defer your rates bill.
(05:09):
If you are a retiree and you're struggling to pay it,
you can defer it and pay it once you eventually
sell that house.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Right, So, raising rates or raising property valuations, it's not
a council cash grab.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
No, No, there is a I think you could say
there's a council cash grab going on in that some
areas are increasing rates by a quarter twenty five percent
because they want to spend more, so they're definitely grabbing
more cash. But it's not like the councils there being
like how can we push up house prices? Because if
we push up house prices, that naturally means that we
(05:48):
can charge everybody more rates. It's about the percentage that
each of us.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Pay the rates but will get.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
It's not like because if you're values drop, it doesn't
mean your rate spills go down, rate bill goes down, doesn't.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
It just means it increases that are stole rate than
it otherwise. Whatever.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Yeah, So pretty much, if you were If your CV foil,
say fifteen percent, you're alluded to the average there was
down about nine If your CV fel fifteen percent, you're
probably still going to see a rate spill increase, but
it might just be smaller than others. If your CV
foul five percent, you're going to see a ratespell increase,
and it may well be a little bit bigger than others.
So really this is set as at May twenty twenty four.
(06:28):
It's away of allocating rates across every home in Auckland,
nothing more than that.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Were you surprised by some of the revaluations.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
I was surprised that some of them didn't go down more. Actually,
because the most recent rates were taken in about May
twenty twenty four, kind of mid last year is when
the current cvs that just came out were set. Certainly
in Auckland, the previous ones were set really close to
the peak of the property market, which was round and
(07:00):
June twenty twenty one. Well, since that point we've seen
property values in Auckland fall roughly about twenty percent. The
fact that the average CV dropped only nine percent in Auckland,
I thought, actually that's a bit less of a drop
than I was expecting.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
And should renters care about CVS and rates? How does
it affect them?
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Only to a very very small degree. If rates are increasing,
that means more costs on your landlord. You will see
some people say that, well, if the if landlord's costs
go up, they then pass that onto the tenants. But
at a market like we're in today, that doesn't really happen.
Renters rarely do hold the upper hand a bit because
we've got a lot of supply on the market in
(07:46):
terms of lots of landlords trying to find tenants, and
it's a bit slower for them at the moment they're
finding it is taking an extra week to get a
tenant in. And because of that, even though rates are
increasing in places like Auckland, you are rents tick down
a little bit. So I wouldn't be too concerned at
least in this market if I was a renter seeing
(08:07):
that rates have gone up.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Right, What about if you're on the market for a house,
you're looking for somewhere to buy, how do you leverage
cvs in your negotiation process?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Perhaps kind of depends what you're trying to do in
which side of the table you're on.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
So it's something a bit cheaper.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yeah, yeah, I'll.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
May be a good example a Native mind was trying
to sell their property. They looked at their CV and
they thought, hmmm, we've done some renovations to this property,
so the CV looks a bit low.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I know what we'll do.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
We'll go to the council and we'll try and get
that CV adjusted up and that will mean that we
pay a little bit more rates temporarily, but that will
look a bit better to the buyer because then they'll think, wow,
if the CV is up here, that means we're getting
a really good deal. And so one trick if you
are selling your property and you've done some renovations all
(09:01):
the market has moved up is it does cost you
the money. But if you get a registered valuation, you
can go to the council and say, hey, put my
CV up And even though it means that the next
buyer will have to pay slightly more in rates, often
that's going to help you in terms of positioning where
your property is.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
That sounds a bit sneaky, ed.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Is it? It's not sneaky. The CV is the CV
an actual fact. Buyers and sellers should not really care
too much about the cvs, because they're really out of date.
Even sitting here today, the CV of my house was
set twelve months ago, so that doesn't really reflect the
value of what the property is today. But given that
some buyers and some sellers really care about the CV
(09:43):
and think that that's an accurate reflection of the value.
If you are a seller, if you are a buyer,
then this is about how do you position how do
you position this house to either get the price that
you want or the sale price that you want.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Looking at house prices in general, how are things performing
at the moment? I've seen reporting, including from Opus Partners,
on a two tier recovery happening around New Zealand. Can
you explain that to us?
Speaker 1 (10:17):
We are seeing some parts of the country pretty much
flat or still going down. Parts of Wellington over the
last twelve months have seen property prices fall four five
in some cases up to nine percent. So we're still seeing,
especially Wellingtonian's doing it really tough. Compare that to a
place like in the cargol Over the last twelve months,
house prices up four percent since the bottom of the
(10:39):
market about two years ago. In the Cargo City, house
prices are up around about fifteen percent since the bottom
of the market. Dunedin's up eight percent, Queenstown's up eleven percent,
christ Church is up seven percent. So if you're sitting
here in Auckland's like i am, you're probably seeing a
very very flat property market.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
But not everywhere in the.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Country is flat, and so we are in this period
where you're going to get a lot of conflicting information
about our house prices going up, are they going down,
are they staying the same. The other thing that's going
to contribute to that is that while we're in this
flat market, there are three different data providers that the
media will quote qv core Logic, which is ow called Totality,
(11:20):
and the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand. Because all
of these organizations release different measures, one data company might
be saying house prices are going up while another one
is saying they're going down. And we just saw that
last month where Cotality formerly core Logic, was saying yep,
house prices have ticked up zero point two percent over
the last month, and just a couple of weeks before that,
(11:41):
Rhymes came out and said house prices are down zero
point six percent.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Right, So when it comes to reading into those valuations
and those kind of that criteria critiques. We've got to
keep it kind of like treat it like a political
poll maybe, so pick and choose things and really look
into the data really to see what we can get
from it, rather than just taking everything verbatim.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Do you know, well, that's a really good analogy.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Never heard somebody explain it that way, But that's exactly
how you should think about it. Just like political polls
are up or down, they are just one reading. You
probably do want to look at all of the different
data sources together. The truth of the matter is the
property market is pretty flat. We are seeing that and
across a range of different measures. So I'll give you
another example. It's not just house prices that are pretty flat.
(12:29):
New build dwelling consents have basically flattened out and have
for the last year to eighteen months. We're now roughly
issuing the same number of new dwelling consents that we
were back in twenty nineteen. So during the big COVID boom,
we saw this massive ramp up in construction that's now
come back and is settled down around that twenty nineteen
(12:50):
level housing stocks. Another one to look at. We saw
this massive ramp up of lots and lots and lots
of people listing their properties for sale over the last
year to eighteen months. That has now flattened out in
terms of the amount of housing stock. It's landed out
at a high level, but there's just a bit more
stability going on in the market at that moment.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
There is an objection process for the CVS. If you
believe that the CV is incorrect for your property. Now
reasons that you might want to do this. The most
likely reason would be that the CV is significantly higher
than you would expect, which means you'd pay more rates
than you would expect, so you might want to object
to get the CV lower. The other reason is that
(13:33):
some parties in the market, and we wouldn't really agree
with this, but some parties do use the CV as
like a benchmark if they're selling their property, and they
might want to get it higher for that reason. Although
we would argue that better quality information means that the
cvs are less important for that purpose these days, but
put that aside, you might want to object to it.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Right when I moved to New Zealand, one of the
things I always heard about was the housing cre crisis
that was ten years ago. Granted, but it does feel
like we aren't talking about this crisis. We're not in
crisis mode these days, a thing stabilizing in terms of
those new builds and in terms of the housing market
in a whole.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Yeah, you did right.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
We've moved on to about seventy five other crisis we're found. Yeah,
and it's nice to see it. Australian, come the other way,
come over the side of the tasmhen. It's great to
have you here, Chelsey.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
We have of us here.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
We are seeing that stability now in terms of the
level of housing stock flatted out, the level of new
build dwelling consents flatten out, house prices flattening out. It's
only when we really start to see a lot of
inflation house prices skyrocket that we start to really call
it a crisis. I do think in five, ten, fifteen
years time there will be another cycle where it comes
(14:47):
back and we're talking about a housing crisis again. But
at the moment, because a lot of things are flattening
out and stabilizing, our attention is elsewhere. It is a
great time to be a home buyer right now. There
is a a lot of housing stock on the market,
more than we've had for the last about ten years.
While interest rates are coming down and so there are
(15:08):
there are more buyers stepping forward and saying, yes, we
are going to purchase. But that's not translating into higher
house prices, and that's not translating into fewer listings property
listings available on the likes of trade me or one
roof for real Estate dot courd Denz.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
So finally, ed overall, how do you rate the health
of the housing market?
Speaker 3 (15:30):
Oh, on a scale of what Chelsea?
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Oh, go on, I haven't thought that far ahead. Give
it like out of ten stars or something.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
I would give it like a four or a five.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
It's not sick anymore in terms of house prices falling
massively and homeowner has been really worried about that. Across
most of the country, it's pretty stable across again, those
number of listings online, properties selling again, it's all pretty safe.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
I'd give it four or five.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
But having said that, houses are still expensive, right, so
if you were a first home buyer look at the market,
you'd say absolutely not, it's one out of ten because
I'm still struggling to purchase the House.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Thanks for joining us, ed Thanks Chelsea.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is also
a sound engineer.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
get your podcasts, and tune in on Monday for another
look behind the headlines.
Hilda.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald. Rates have
increased across the country this week, with some cities better
off than others. Auckland Council has confirmed a five point
eight percent average residential rates increase, the same day that
(00:30):
Wellington's council struck a twelve percent lift in their rates. Meanwhile,
Gisbon residents face an average nine point ninety five percent
rate increase, which equates to about four hundred dollars or
less for eighty percent of homeowners there, and the increases
have come at the same time as council valuations in
(00:50):
Auckland dropped by nine percent. But what do lower cvs
mean for your rates bill and what does it mean
in the context of the wider property market Today? On
the front Page, opuh's partner's economist Ed McKnight is with
us to bust some myths about valuations, rates and the
(01:11):
current state of the housing market. Ed, we've seen a
variety in rates increases around the country, which mostly all
came in effect at the start of the month. What
are some of the trends that you've seen this year.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Well, the most interesting thing is some areas aren't seeing
massive rates increases, like place like Wanganu we are only
up two point two percent. Auckland that are actually below
average as well, up about five point eight percent. But
some council areas have really ramped up rates. Down on
the West Coast, we've seen regional rates go up over
twenty five percent. My understanding is that Hastings Napier are
(01:54):
all up over twenty percent as well. Pretty easy to
understand why, given that they've had some really big issues
with weather related events recently. But even areas like Kluther
District way down South and Otago they have seen massive
rates increases there too.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
And the rates increase that's come for Auckland is a
few weeks after homeowners received their council valuations. Now what
is this CV and what does it mean for your
house price?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, it's real interesting. A lot of people are quite
surprised that they've got their new CV. Their house value
appears to drop, but they're still paying a higher rates bill.
And what you've got to understand is that your house
price doesn't necessarily impact the exact amount of rates that
you pay. It does, but kind of in a roundabout way.
So the way that it works is that Auckland Council
or any of the councils will say how much money
(02:46):
do we need to raise this year and spoiler alert,
it's more than last year, and the CV is used
to say, well, how much of a share should each
homeowner have to pay? Well, if your house is a
bit more expensive than somebody else's house, you probably have
more money, so you pay a higher share of those rates.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
So even though most.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
People's cvs have gone down, their house values have gone down,
what really matters is, well, how much has rules changed
compared to everyone else's. So if your house value didn't
go down by the average of about nine percent, then
you will pay a higher share of your rates of
the rates in total and get an above average rates increase.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
Right, So I was doing some research and I came
across some common myths or assumptions online about rates and cvs.
One was that because property values have reduced, your rates
will reduce as well.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
Is that right extically what we were just talking about.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
There's another myth that councils really want house prices to
go up because then they get to charge everybody more
and more rates. But if your house value goes up
or goes down by ten percent, that doesn't mean that
the council charges you ten percent more if your house
value in or charges your ten percent less because the
house value has gone down. It's all about what is
(04:04):
the share of rates that you pay, and the cvs
are just the mechanism to make sure that people who
have more money and can afford more expensive houses end
up paying a higher share.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Is that a bit of an old school assumption though,
just because you live in a real snazzy house that
you've presumably got more money to pay rates.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
I think it's probably quite a simple way about going
about it, because there are lots of different ways that
you could decide, well, who pays more, who pays less.
I think it's a pretty fair way to go about it. Personally,
I live in an above average house, and so I
pay and above average share. I have an above average
rates bill. I kind of think that's fair. Where it
(04:46):
does come a little bit unstuck, as if you're a retiree.
So let's say you bought a house for a packet
of raspberries back in nineteen eighties. Now your house value
might be way way way way more expensive. Now, that's
good because you've got some more equity. But if you're
a retiree, maybe your income's gone down. But there are
targeted packages of support, like you can defer your rates bill.
(05:09):
If you are a retiree and you're struggling to pay it,
you can defer it and pay it once you eventually
sell that house.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Right, So, raising rates or raising property valuations, it's not
a council cash grab.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
No, No, there is a I think you could say
there's a council cash grab going on in that some
areas are increasing rates by a quarter twenty five percent
because they want to spend more, so they're definitely grabbing
more cash. But it's not like the councils there being
like how can we push up house prices? Because if
we push up house prices, that naturally means that we
(05:48):
can charge everybody more rates. It's about the percentage that
each of us.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Pay the rates but will get.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
It's not like because if you're values drop, it doesn't
mean your rate spills go down, rate bill goes down, doesn't.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
It just means it increases that are stole rate than
it otherwise. Whatever.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Yeah, So pretty much, if you were If your CV foil,
say fifteen percent, you're alluded to the average there was
down about nine If your CV fel fifteen percent, you're
probably still going to see a rate spill increase, but
it might just be smaller than others. If your CV
foul five percent, you're going to see a ratespell increase,
and it may well be a little bit bigger than others.
So really this is set as at May twenty twenty four.
(06:28):
It's away of allocating rates across every home in Auckland,
nothing more than that.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Were you surprised by some of the revaluations.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
I was surprised that some of them didn't go down more. Actually,
because the most recent rates were taken in about May
twenty twenty four, kind of mid last year is when
the current cvs that just came out were set. Certainly
in Auckland, the previous ones were set really close to
the peak of the property market, which was round and
(07:00):
June twenty twenty one. Well, since that point we've seen
property values in Auckland fall roughly about twenty percent. The
fact that the average CV dropped only nine percent in Auckland,
I thought, actually that's a bit less of a drop
than I was expecting.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
And should renters care about CVS and rates? How does
it affect them?
Speaker 1 (07:23):
Only to a very very small degree. If rates are increasing,
that means more costs on your landlord. You will see
some people say that, well, if the if landlord's costs
go up, they then pass that onto the tenants. But
at a market like we're in today, that doesn't really happen.
Renters rarely do hold the upper hand a bit because
we've got a lot of supply on the market in
(07:46):
terms of lots of landlords trying to find tenants, and
it's a bit slower for them at the moment they're
finding it is taking an extra week to get a
tenant in. And because of that, even though rates are
increasing in places like Auckland, you are rents tick down
a little bit. So I wouldn't be too concerned at
least in this market if I was a renter seeing
(08:07):
that rates have gone up.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Right, What about if you're on the market for a house,
you're looking for somewhere to buy, how do you leverage
cvs in your negotiation process?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Perhaps kind of depends what you're trying to do in
which side of the table you're on.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
So it's something a bit cheaper.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yeah, yeah, I'll.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
May be a good example a Native mind was trying
to sell their property. They looked at their CV and
they thought, hmmm, we've done some renovations to this property,
so the CV looks a bit low.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I know what we'll do.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
We'll go to the council and we'll try and get
that CV adjusted up and that will mean that we
pay a little bit more rates temporarily, but that will
look a bit better to the buyer because then they'll think, wow,
if the CV is up here, that means we're getting
a really good deal. And so one trick if you
are selling your property and you've done some renovations all
(09:01):
the market has moved up is it does cost you
the money. But if you get a registered valuation, you
can go to the council and say, hey, put my
CV up And even though it means that the next
buyer will have to pay slightly more in rates, often
that's going to help you in terms of positioning where
your property is.
Speaker 3 (09:18):
That sounds a bit sneaky, ed.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Is it? It's not sneaky. The CV is the CV
an actual fact. Buyers and sellers should not really care
too much about the cvs, because they're really out of date.
Even sitting here today, the CV of my house was
set twelve months ago, so that doesn't really reflect the
value of what the property is today. But given that
some buyers and some sellers really care about the CV
(09:43):
and think that that's an accurate reflection of the value.
If you are a seller, if you are a buyer,
then this is about how do you position how do
you position this house to either get the price that
you want or the sale price that you want.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Looking at house prices in general, how are things performing
at the moment? I've seen reporting, including from Opus Partners,
on a two tier recovery happening around New Zealand. Can
you explain that to us?
Speaker 1 (10:17):
We are seeing some parts of the country pretty much
flat or still going down. Parts of Wellington over the
last twelve months have seen property prices fall four five
in some cases up to nine percent. So we're still seeing,
especially Wellingtonian's doing it really tough. Compare that to a
place like in the cargol Over the last twelve months,
house prices up four percent since the bottom of the
(10:39):
market about two years ago. In the Cargo City, house
prices are up around about fifteen percent since the bottom
of the market. Dunedin's up eight percent, Queenstown's up eleven percent,
christ Church is up seven percent. So if you're sitting
here in Auckland's like i am, you're probably seeing a
very very flat property market.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
But not everywhere in the.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
Country is flat, and so we are in this period
where you're going to get a lot of conflicting information
about our house prices going up, are they going down,
are they staying the same. The other thing that's going
to contribute to that is that while we're in this
flat market, there are three different data providers that the
media will quote qv core Logic, which is ow called Totality,
(11:20):
and the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand. Because all
of these organizations release different measures, one data company might
be saying house prices are going up while another one
is saying they're going down. And we just saw that
last month where Cotality formerly core Logic, was saying yep,
house prices have ticked up zero point two percent over
the last month, and just a couple of weeks before that,
(11:41):
Rhymes came out and said house prices are down zero
point six percent.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Right, So when it comes to reading into those valuations
and those kind of that criteria critiques. We've got to
keep it kind of like treat it like a political
poll maybe, so pick and choose things and really look
into the data really to see what we can get
from it, rather than just taking everything verbatim.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Do you know, well, that's a really good analogy.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Never heard somebody explain it that way, But that's exactly
how you should think about it. Just like political polls
are up or down, they are just one reading. You
probably do want to look at all of the different
data sources together. The truth of the matter is the
property market is pretty flat. We are seeing that and
across a range of different measures. So I'll give you
another example. It's not just house prices that are pretty flat.
(12:29):
New build dwelling consents have basically flattened out and have
for the last year to eighteen months. We're now roughly
issuing the same number of new dwelling consents that we
were back in twenty nineteen. So during the big COVID boom,
we saw this massive ramp up in construction that's now
come back and is settled down around that twenty nineteen
(12:50):
level housing stocks. Another one to look at. We saw
this massive ramp up of lots and lots and lots
of people listing their properties for sale over the last
year to eighteen months. That has now flattened out in
terms of the amount of housing stock. It's landed out
at a high level, but there's just a bit more
stability going on in the market at that moment.
Speaker 5 (13:11):
There is an objection process for the CVS. If you
believe that the CV is incorrect for your property. Now
reasons that you might want to do this. The most
likely reason would be that the CV is significantly higher
than you would expect, which means you'd pay more rates
than you would expect, so you might want to object
to get the CV lower. The other reason is that
(13:33):
some parties in the market, and we wouldn't really agree
with this, but some parties do use the CV as
like a benchmark if they're selling their property, and they
might want to get it higher for that reason. Although
we would argue that better quality information means that the
cvs are less important for that purpose these days, but
put that aside, you might want to object to it.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Right when I moved to New Zealand, one of the
things I always heard about was the housing cre crisis
that was ten years ago. Granted, but it does feel
like we aren't talking about this crisis. We're not in
crisis mode these days, a thing stabilizing in terms of
those new builds and in terms of the housing market
in a whole.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Yeah, you did right.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
We've moved on to about seventy five other crisis we're found. Yeah,
and it's nice to see it. Australian, come the other way,
come over the side of the tasmhen. It's great to
have you here, Chelsey.
Speaker 2 (14:23):
We have of us here.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
We are seeing that stability now in terms of the
level of housing stock flatted out, the level of new
build dwelling consents flatten out, house prices flattening out. It's
only when we really start to see a lot of
inflation house prices skyrocket that we start to really call
it a crisis. I do think in five, ten, fifteen
years time there will be another cycle where it comes
(14:47):
back and we're talking about a housing crisis again. But
at the moment, because a lot of things are flattening
out and stabilizing, our attention is elsewhere. It is a
great time to be a home buyer right now. There
is a a lot of housing stock on the market,
more than we've had for the last about ten years.
While interest rates are coming down and so there are
(15:08):
there are more buyers stepping forward and saying, yes, we
are going to purchase. But that's not translating into higher
house prices, and that's not translating into fewer listings property
listings available on the likes of trade me or one
roof for real Estate dot courd Denz.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
So finally, ed overall, how do you rate the health
of the housing market?
Speaker 3 (15:30):
Oh, on a scale of what Chelsea?
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Oh, go on, I haven't thought that far ahead. Give
it like out of ten stars or something.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
I would give it like a four or a five.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
It's not sick anymore in terms of house prices falling
massively and homeowner has been really worried about that. Across
most of the country, it's pretty stable across again, those
number of listings online, properties selling again, it's all pretty safe.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
I'd give it four or five.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
But having said that, houses are still expensive, right, so
if you were a first home buyer look at the market,
you'd say absolutely not, it's one out of ten because
I'm still struggling to purchase the House.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Thanks for joining us, ed Thanks Chelsea.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is also
a sound engineer.
Speaker 3 (16:34):
I'm Chelsea Daniels.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you
get your podcasts, and tune in on Monday for another
look behind the headlines.
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