Kevin Milne: Real estate woes and property pressures

Finding a place to live can be challenging whether you’re a renter or a potential buyer. 

Kevin Milne’s been thinking about real-estate, particularly deadline sales and sales by tender and the pressures they place on buyers – first home buyers in particular. 

He also heard from his son living over in London, that renting a flat is no longer a matter of getting your application in first, but rather you have to be willing to bid for it. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack tam podcast
from News Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
A'd be Jack, says Mike, he's intentionally crashing the stock
so he and his mates can buy and lo then
remove the tariffs. Well, that's cynical, Mike, But I suppose
there is some kind of some people will see logic
in that Jack Trump has taken all allies hostage, the
US can no longer be considered an ally. Well, I
don't think it's a formal ally of New Zealand, but

(00:33):
I do think you make a really good point. But
even if all of these tariffs were removed, right, we
went back to how things were six months ago, tariff wise,
at the very least, there is nothing that can assure
other countries around the world that even if a completely
conventional type president is elected in three and a half
years time, that in the future, the American public won't

(00:54):
elect another Donald Trump like figure who is prepared to
make pretty spur of the moment volatile kind of decisions
that throw the global order into the kind of madness
we're experiencing it the moment. So yeah, I think you're right.
We probably can't rely on America to be nearly as
stable as it has been in the past. Jeff has
good advice for us of well, don't look at your

(01:15):
key we saver account for today. I'll get tomorrow your feedback.
In a couple of minutes seventeen past nine on News Dogs,
he'd being Kevin Milne is with us this morning, Kilder, Kevin.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
Gellaad Jack. What do you reckon? Do you think that
Trump is now less popular in America than he was?
I supporters he's even greater now think.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
I think among his supporters, I think there is I
think when Trump says he could walk down Fath Avenue
and shoot someone, I think like among his supporters, his
die hard supporters, there is literally nothing that would stop
him from being the kind of, you know, the popular
figure that he is. It is almost kind of cultish,
the slavish devotion to him. So even when there is

(02:00):
a very little coherence around some of the arguments, people just,
I think, absolutely love him. I also think that applies
to other politicians on the other side of things. But
I think with Trumpets, especially pronounced that being said, I reckon,
there are some probably a big slab of more marginal
voters who supported him in the last election. But are thinking, oh,
I actually, you know, I did like it when stuff

(02:21):
was a little less expensive. I do like economic growth.
I don't love inflation. And those people might be that
their support might be a little bit, you know, a
little bit less firm. But yeah, it's going to be
amazing to see. I mean, you know, one thing to
point out is that there are already countries that are
lowering their tariffs to try and plicate him, and so
if you you know, and maybe he'll say, this is
the thing. It's just a negotiating tactic to get everyone

(02:43):
to lower tariffs on the US. But I mean, you know,
he put out that list yesterday, I said New Zealand
had a twenty percent tariff on the US.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
We just don't.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
I mean, it's just totally factually, just totally incorrect. But
facts no matter in this world, Kevin. Facts don't matter him. Anyway.
You have been you have been thinking about the economy
of this week, and in particular you've been thinking about
real estate.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Always felt sorry for people bidding for houses and deadline
sales and sales by tender. Having done all their due
diligence at considerable cost, they have to put in a
bid with no idea what the other bids look like.
You find a house you like, you pay for a
builder's report, you pay for it to be valued, You

(03:26):
run it past the lawyer, more costs, and wait a
month or so to find that, once again, you've been
out bid. Hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars spent, still no house.
Really tough on first home buyers. I've been on both
sides of deadline sales. When I sold, I did really

(03:47):
well out of it, but I hated being a buyer.
Deadline sales and sales by tender are designed for the seller.
Now fair enough, you could say real estate agents work
for and are paid for by the seller. My son
tells me that in central London now, if you want
to get rental accommodation a flat, you have to pitch

(04:11):
for it. You find the flat that you like, and
you're forward in writing what rent you've prepared to pay
for it. The highest bid gets the flat. It's no
longer a matter of getting in first, which was bad enough.
It's a matter of how much money you've got. I
hope bidding for rentals hasn't hit New Zealand. Yet. Have you?

(04:33):
Are you aware that it has or hasn't yet.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
Well, I actually think we're in this curious moment Kevin,
where rental demand is down as much lower than it was,
so I think for the first time, and however many years,
renters have slightly more power than they did in the past.
So I think it's quite different to how it is
in the UK. But I'm sure that hasn't yet.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
Yeah, you think it has back when you know, I
look back back when I bought my first house. It
was so much simpler and it seemed to work for everyone.
You looked at photos of houses in the paper or
at a real estate office, and under each photo was
the price the owner wanted for them. Simple as that,

(05:14):
you'd be taken on the tour of the house, and
if you wanted it, you'd not five percent off what
the owner wanted and put in an offer and usually
the house was yours. Now, especially for first owned buyers,
bidding makes buying your house a bit of a nightmare.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
I think, yeah, it's so tough a I mean, just yeah,
it speaks to some kind of imbalance. But you can
imagine how stressful that must be if you're trying to
trying to get a flat. I mean it's yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:45):
And the time it all takes. Yeah, you know, you
put in your bed and you waded around and wait around,
and then you don't get it again. You know, it
turns out there were fifteen other bidders, and you're not
quite sure how far your bid was off the was
off the top until the the information comes clear. Now

(06:08):
I find it, I find I'm very very pleased. I'm
nothing at first. I'm not a first own bar anymore.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
Yeah, all right, Kevin, Hey, thank you so much for
your time. Appreciate it is even Kevin Milne there.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
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