Peter Thompson: Barfoot & Thompson Managing Director on Auckland house prices rising in July

Auckland house prices have held firm through a busy July. 

Real estate agency Barfoot & Thompson's revealed it sold 957 properties across the Auckland region last month – its highest July total in four years. 

More than 46% of sales sat at more than a million dollars and new listings rose more than 14%. 

Managing Director Peter Thompson says the market's holding steady and is ready to take-off when interest rates come down further. 

He told Mike Hosking things are starting to move again with more first-time home buyers entering the market and more activity from developers as a result of the fast track legislation.  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Got some fascinating data around Auckland housing. July hotter than
a hot thing. Apparently, sales up nine percent from June
nine percent. New listing's up fourteen percent month on month.
Now for Buffett and Thompson, they sold nine hundred and
fifty seven properties. Is that a lot? Yes, it's the
most in four years. Peter Thompson's managing director, of course,
and as with us, Peter morning, Yeah, good morning, Mike.
Is this an outlier or is August going to track

(00:21):
some So we're heading towards springing a new tomorrow and
the whole world's changing.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Yeah. I think if we take the last three to
six months, we've actually been tracking up very slightly month
after month, and I think there's just a little bit
more confidence coming in the real estate market. Traditionally June
and July are our slowest month's been winter, but yeah,
we're actually starting to see a lot more activity, which

(00:47):
is very pleasing.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Can we cut through it all and have some reasons?
I mean, why would you list in the middle of
winter unless you have to? A people leaving the country.
Are they feeling bullish and trading up? What's going on?

Speaker 2 (00:58):
No, we're actually starting to see see quite a lot
of first home buyers getting into the market that you know,
the average median and average sale price for Auckland have
come down just slightly over the last few months. You know,
we were originally at the beginning of the esay over
a million dollars. We're now down around about nine hundred
and ninety thousand. So we're starting to see a few

(01:19):
more of the first home buyers, a little bit more
activity with some of the developers, with the fast tracking
that's come in, there's a little bit more movement starting
to happen, and everything's just sort of just starting and
I think that's the pleasing thing. But it's all led
by the interest rates of course.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
Okay, So if we're doing and feeling that right here
now in the depths of winter, could we feel bullish
about September, October and November.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
I personally think we well, I wouldn't say bullish, but
certainly we're going to see a lot more activity. And traditionally,
you know, September October, as you say, are our better months.
When the weather comes out, we certainly start seeing the
higher priced properties come in. That will effect obviously the
average sale price. But you know, if you average it
out over the year, we're really basically the price is

(02:06):
aesthetic and the volume of properties are increasing.

Speaker 1 (02:09):
And what do you what weight do you place on
the so called interest rate flow through? So allegedly you've
got a couple more cuts coming from the r but
it's not automatic into the retail end. But nevertheless, it's
you know, it's putting pressure on the data. Does that
fire everything up?

Speaker 2 (02:23):
It certainly does. But I think it's not just for property.
I think you know, getting money in their hands is
certainly helping with you know, the average person on the
street with every day spending. And you know, we just
got to look at what's happened in the rural market.
The farmers are happy and now we're starting to see
you know, most probably the rural in sales over the

(02:45):
last three or four years have been almost non existent.
But now it's doing to the activity and that's all
good signs.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
I know, it's a big talking point in the industry.
If Lux and Tomorrow announced that your foreign buyers can
come back and start buying four or five million dollar houses,
how really does that affect the market? Do you think.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
It won't affect It's huge and I've heard these discussions
going on and in reality that there's the protection for
the first home buy you know, the five million really
will only most probably affect say maybe Auckland and say
the Southern Lakes districts. We need to be able to

(03:26):
spread it through the country and they may have to
lower that that five million, but maybe they have to
add on extra for investment that they're talking about. So
a total of ten million dollars, it could be five
million in Auckland with five million investment. It could be
three million, say in Wellington with seven million investment. I
think they just need to be aware that we've got

(03:48):
to be able to spread some of those foreign buyers.
There's a lot of people wanting to come. I've just
come back from Singapore, for instance. It was amazing over there.
They have free trade and a combined they don't apply
to our policy. Very few Singaporeans realized that, and I
think that's a message we've actually got to get out
to them. Well.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
Sid appreciate times of works Peter Thompson, who's the managing
director of course at Barfoot and Thompson. For more from
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