Auckland house prices accelerate in November while volumes decline, Barfoot says

Thursday 3rd December 2015

Auckland house price growth accelerated in November, although the volume of sales declined, according to the city's largest realtor.

The average sale price increased 4.2 percent to $876,075 in November from October, the biggest monthly gain in 20 months, Barfoot & Thompson said in a statement. However the number of sales slowed 7.7 percent to 986 in the month, the lowest volume since February, the agency said.

The government and the Reserve Bank have introduced new measures to try and cool Auckland's bubbling property market, where migrants and investor are adding to competition for a shortage of housing. The central bank introduced Auckland-specific lending restrictions in November, while the government's more stringent enforcement of taxing speculators' capital gains began in October.

"There has been a measurable decrease in market activity," said Barfoot & Thompson director Kiri Barfoot. "It remains to be seen if prices continue to ignore the tighter regulations, or whether November’s prices are the last remnants of momentum that built in the lead up to the introduction of the tighter measures."

The number of houses sold for between $500,000 to $750,000, the price category most popular with investors who have portfolios of less than three properties, slipped 19 percent to 286 in November from October, Barfoot said.

Meanwhile sales of houses in other price categories were at similar levels to the previous month, the agency said.

The realtor's new listings in November dropped 7.5 percent from October to a seven-month low of 1,683. At the end of the month, Barfoot had 3,252 properties on its books, in line with the 3,264 at the end of October.

The number of houses sold at auction in Auckland has fallen, with some agencies reporting clearance rates as low as 30 percent, when they had regularly been around 85 percent, state valuer Quotable Value said in a separate report this week. The valuer also noted that value levels among some categories of housing in Auckland, in particular investment housing stock appeared to have fallen.

Nearby centres such as Hamilton and Tauranga also posted strong gains, the valuer said.

BusinessDesk.co.nz

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