REAL PROPERTY HOTSPOTS
NZ’s highest growth towns and suburbs
boom country towns into real estate hotspots as home buyers search for cheaper alternatives to skyrocketing city prices. Figures compiled by the
show the country’s hottest residential property market is in Foxton, a small North Island town 20km north of Levin.
According to figures from the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand, the median selling price of homes in Foxton was $180,000 last month, a massive 59 per cent increase on the $113,500 median price in November last year. Over the same period the number of homes being sold in the town has more than doubled.
In the 12 months to November 2011, only 34 homes were sold in the town, but in the 12 months to November this year the number of sales jumped to 77. The figures do not appear to be an anomaly. Also rating highly on the
list of top-20 real estate were nearby Foxton Beach and Waikanae Beach.
Other small towns to feature on the list were Arrowtown and Darfield in the South Island, Helensville on Auckland’s northern outskirts, and Oneroa on Waiheke Island.
Given the way the Auckland property market has grown this past year, it is surprising that only four central suburbs made the list: Mt Roskill, Parnell, Grafton and Epsom.
To be included on our list, suburbs or localities had to have recorded an increase in their median price of at least 30 per cent between November 2011 and November 2012 and a minimum 30 per cent increase in the number of sales in the 12 months to November (refer to graphic for the full list).
That made those locations true hotspots because not only were their prices rising strongly, so were the number of homes being sold, meaning the overall real estate activity in these areas was outstripping activity in other parts of the country.
Over the same periods, the national median price increased by 4.3 per cent, while the number of homes sold increased by 8.2 per cent.
REINZ chief executive Helen O’Sullivan said for sales activity in towns like Foxton to increase so much in a 12- month period was ‘‘quite remarkable’’.
‘‘We are seeing a lot of what are called displacement effects, where people say, ‘OK, I’ve got $400,000 to spend, what can I get for that’,’’ she said. That included looking at options outside of the main centres and weighing up the pros and cons.
‘‘People are prepared to make more of a compromise on things like travelling times in order not to have to compromise on space,’’ O’Sullivan said.
That was often helped by the fact that many employers were prepared to help with flexible working hours, which allowed people to avoid rush-hour traffic when they needed to commute into the city, and the growth of technology which allowed people to work from home, she said.
O’Sullivan does see current property boom changing much in the coming year.
‘‘It’s going to be interesting. Auckland and Christchurch, supply issues are going to continue to be a problem.’’
She said that over the five years from 2003 to 2008, the number of homes sold each year was equivalent to about 6 per cent of the total housing stock but now it was running at only 4 per cent.
O’Sullivan said she expected the housing market to continue to firm in 2013, ‘‘but probably at a slightly slower pace’’.