New low for January house sales in Auckland market

Auckland house sale numbers fell to new seasonal lows at the start of the year as buyers continue to hold back, the city’s largest real estate agency says.

Barfoot & Thompson’s latest figures showed it sold 431 properties in January, a 46.2% drop on the 801 sold at the same time last year.

Sales were also down by 18.2% on December and by 30.3% on the average of the previous three months.

January is usually the lowest sales month of the year but last month’s trading was the slowest in 20 years, the agency’s managing director, Peter Thompson, said.

In a reflection of the quiet market, sale prices also fell, with the median price down 6.3% to $1 million, from $1.06m in December.

It had declined 15.3% annually, from $1.18m in January last year, and was now where the median price was at in early 2021.

The average sale price in January was $1.11m, down by 3.4% on $1.15m in December, and by 9.3% on $1.23m at the same time last year.

Thompson said last month stood out for its lack of buyer commitment, despite a good level of buyer interest in the marketplace.

‘‘Our agents report that attendances at open homes throughout January were higher than they were in the last quarter of last year but buyers continued to sit on the sideline in January.’’

Buyers were either waiting for prices to fall even more, were cautious about mortgage interest rates or were finding obtaining financing too challenging, he said.

‘‘The level of interest being shown could indicate that buyers may be anticipating the bottom of the price cycle is not far off.’’

The rural and lifestyle markets experienced the same trading challenges as urban areas last month, with buyers and sellers having different views on value, he said.

Agents have said properties were taking longer to sell and the agency’s figures showed the number of properties listed for sale at the end of the month had built up to 4747.

That was up 24% from the 3827 listed last January and was despite an 18.9% decline in the number of new listings compared with the same time last year.

The latest figures from Realestate.co.nz, which were out Wednesday, also showed an annual increase in the number of properties on the market and a decrease in new listings, in Auckland and nationally.

It had Auckland’s total housing stock up 17.1% to 9950 in January and new listings in the region down by 26.5%. The average number of days that Auckland listings were online had increased by 40.1%.