By Leith van Onselen The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) has released its April house price results, which registered a modest increase in values nationally, with prices also hitting a new record. In the month of April, the national stratified median price rose by 0.1% to $447,500. Prices rose by 2.0% in Auckland
By Leith van Onselen While Australia’s Reserve Bank has taken a back seat, and let the Australian dollar run, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBNZ) has today warned markets that it could intervene and sell NZ dollars if the currency remains high. Speaking at the DairyNZ conference in Hamilton this morning, RBNZ governor, Graeme Wheeler,
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) has once again hiked the official cash rate (OCR) by 0.25% to 3.00% on the back of growing strength in the New Zealand economy. From the Statement: New Zealand’s economic expansion has considerable momentum, with GDP estimated to have grown by 3.5 percent in
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) Michael Reddell has written an interesting paper questioning the merits of New Zealand’s high immigration program, which appears to have crowded-out (through higher interest rates and a high average real exchange rate) other productive investment, lowering living standards in the process: Over the last
By Leith van Onselen New Zealand’s Housing Minister, Nick Smith, has set an ambitious target to improve the affordability of New Zealand housing back to its long-run average of four times household incomes. From Interest.co.nz: “The target that I’ve given to my ministry goes back to those long term affordability measures – which is the
By Leith van Onselen The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) has released its March house price results, which registered a significant bounce in values nationally, with prices also hitting a new record. In the month of March, the national stratified median price rose by 3.4% to nearly $427,000. Prices rose by 0.4% in
By Leith van Onselen The New Zealand Treasury has released a new research paper questioning the merits of high immigration, and recommending a reduced immigration intake in the event that the economy is unable to adequately cope with population pressures: Reviewing the literature, the balance of evidence suggests that while past immigration has, at times,
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) has released its quarterly bulletin, which contains a frank assessment of its macroprudential caps on high loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage lending. Its conclusion? That the LVR caps have probably reduced New Zealand house prices by around 2.5%: It will be some months before the
By Leith van Onselen After last month taking the fight to Auckland’s entrenched anti-sprawl “NIMBYs” (Not In My Backyard) and “BANANAs” (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone) groups in a speech at an Auckland Chamber of Commerce and Massey University luncheon, and earlier this month attacking town planners for restricting the growth of housing supply,
By Leith van Onselen Statistics New Zealand has released the results from the 2013 Census, which revealed a fall in the country’s home ownership rate by individuals (see below chart). According to Statistics New Zealand, only 49.8% of people aged 15 years and over owned or partly owned the home they lived in, compared with
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) has for the first time in nearly three years hiked the official cash rate by 0.25% to 2.75% on the back of growing strength in the New Zealand economy. The RBNZ has also raised its forward guidance on rate hikes, forecasting 1.25% of hikes
By Leith van Onselen After last week taking the fight to Auckland’s entrenched anti-sprawl “NIMBYs” (Not In My Backyard) and “BANANAs” (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone) groups in a speech at an Auckland Chamber of Commerce and Massey University luncheon, New Zealand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Bill English, has today attacked town
By Leith van Onselen New Zealand continues to leave Australia for dead when it comes to housing policy. Unlike the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority (APRA), which continue to hose down concerns about risks building in the Australian housing market, New Zealand’s central bank and prudential regulator, the Reserve
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) macroprudential caps on high loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage lending, introduced in October last year, continue to work their magic, with the share of 80%-plus LVR mortgages issued by New Zealand’s banks registering another fall (see next table). According to Interest.co.nz: As of October 1,
By Leith van Onselen Statistics New Zealand last week released the results from the 2013 Census, which revealed another fall in the country’s home ownership rate (see below chart). According to the Census, the share of New Zealand households owning or paying-off a home fell to 64.8% in 2013, from 66.9% at the 2006 Census,
By Leith van Onselen The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) has released its January house price results, which registered another significant fall in values nationally, with prices also down across all of the major markets. In the month of January, the national stratified median price fell by 2.3% to just over $423,000. Prices
By Leith van Onselen Ratings agency, Standard & Poors (S&P), has again warned that New Zealand’s housing market is vulnerable to a sharp correction, especially if there is an external economic shock. While S&P does not expect a big increase in credit losses, it does “consider the stand-alone credit profiles of all banks and credit
By Leith van Onselen Following on from yesterday’s post showing the ongoing contraction in overall housing finance commitments in New Zealand following the implementation of speed limits on high loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage lending by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), the RBNZ has just released new data showing a dramatic fall in the
By Leith van Onselen The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) latest mortgage approval data continues to point to an ongoing weakening of mortgage demand, suggesting that the RBNZ’s speed limits on high loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage lending, introduced on 1 October 2013, are having their desired effect and working to cool the New Zealand
By Leith van Onselen Fairfax’s Max Mason has written a piece today in The SMH arguing that the Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s (RBNZ) speed limits on high loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage lending, implemented on 1 October 2013, are failing to cool New Zealand house prices: Tighter lending restrictions imposed by New Zealand’s central bank
By Leith van Onselen The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) has released its December house price results, which registered a significant fall in quality-adjusted values nationally, with prices also down across two of the three biggest markets. In the month of December, the national stratified median price fell by 1.0% to just over
From Interest.co.nz: Gross Domestic Product rose 1.4% in the September quarter on the back of the largest expansion in the agricultural sector in 25 years, according to Statistics New Zealand. The extremely strong result, on the back of a rebounding dairy market following drought earlier this year, is stronger than the average expectation of economists
Here’s an interesting tidbit: The next three Avatar films will be made in New Zealand, the Prime Minister has announced at a press conference with the film’s director James Cameron. Mr Key announced this morning that the Government had signed a memorandum of understanding with the film’s makers to secure the multi-film deal. He said
From Interest.co.nz: Westpac economists say the slump in house sales volumes during the past two months is a “strong signal” that prices are about to cool. Latest Real Estate Institute figures showed that while the median price surged to a new high of $425,000 in November, the number of sales was down 6.6% compared with
By Leith van Onselen The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) has released its November house price results, which registered an increase in median values nationally, with price increases also recorded across the major markets. In the month of November, the national stratified median price rose by 1.2% to just over $437,000. Prices rose
