More than half of New Zealanders expect house prices will continue to rise over the next six months, a new poll reveals.
A New Zealand Property Institute poll shows the public doesn’t believe the talk that there is a property crash in the cards.
The poll, conducted by Curia Market Research in November, revealed that foreign investors were still seen by the public as having the biggest impact on New Zealand house prices.
PINZ chief executive Ashley Church says the institute commissioned the polling questions to get a better feel for public perceptions about property.
“I’m surprised by some of the results - particularly the unexpectedly broad view that foreign investors are having ‘the biggest impact’ on the property market – but as a snapshot of perceptions these views are important and shouldn’t be ignored.
“The views expressed in the survey aren’t necessarily right – but they’re an important barometer of market sentiment and a guide to buyer behavior”.
Participants in the poll were asked whether they thought property prices would go up, down, or stay the same in the next six months.
“56% of respondents indicated that they believe house prices will increase; only 8% are picking a decrease and 28% opted for ‘stay thesame’,” said Church.
“In other words, a clear majority of people are picking house price inflation to continue for at least another 6 months”.
He said that age group breakdowns also provided some interesting observations, with two thirds of those aged 31-45 (the largest group) being the most certain of property price increases in the next six months, while the age bracket most likely to pick a decrease were those aged over 61 years old (12%).
Geographic breakdowns were also covered. Of those polled, 58% of Aucklanders, 62% of Wellingtonians, 46% of Christchurch locals are expecting property prices to increase in the next six months. In provincial cities the numbers were 57%, in towns 53%, and in rural areas 54%.
Those most likely to pick a decrease were in towns (10%), followed by Auckland (9%) and provincial cities (8%) and rural areas (8%.
Meanwhile in Christchurch 40% of locals are picking prices to stay the same.
The survey also measured the perceived impact, on house prices, of 5 price influencers; foreign investors, local investors, immigrants, Central & Local Government and banks. Participants were asked to rank these on a scale of 0 to 10 with 0 being no impact and 10 being the highest impact.
Foreign Investors were rated as having the largest impact (7), followed by banks (6.2) and domestic investors (6), immigrants (5.6 and lastly Central and Local Government (5.3).
“While people seem to differ on the causes, a significant proportion of them aren’t buying recent talk of an imminent crash and the large majority of people also share our view that a sharp price correction in the housing market is unlikely,” said Church.
“That would tend to confirm our view that the current price slow-down in the Auckland property market is being driven by the Reserve Banks LVR restrictions, rather than any loss of confidence in the Auckland market”.
The poll, conducted by Curia Market Research in November, revealed that foreign investors were still seen by the public as having the biggest impact on New Zealand house prices.
PINZ chief executive Ashley Church says the institute commissioned the polling questions to get a better feel for public perceptions about property.
“I’m surprised by some of the results - particularly the unexpectedly broad view that foreign investors are having ‘the biggest impact’ on the property market – but as a snapshot of perceptions these views are important and shouldn’t be ignored.
“The views expressed in the survey aren’t necessarily right – but they’re an important barometer of market sentiment and a guide to buyer behavior”.
Participants in the poll were asked whether they thought property prices would go up, down, or stay the same in the next six months.
“56% of respondents indicated that they believe house prices will increase; only 8% are picking a decrease and 28% opted for ‘stay thesame’,” said Church.
“In other words, a clear majority of people are picking house price inflation to continue for at least another 6 months”.
He said that age group breakdowns also provided some interesting observations, with two thirds of those aged 31-45 (the largest group) being the most certain of property price increases in the next six months, while the age bracket most likely to pick a decrease were those aged over 61 years old (12%).
Geographic breakdowns were also covered. Of those polled, 58% of Aucklanders, 62% of Wellingtonians, 46% of Christchurch locals are expecting property prices to increase in the next six months. In provincial cities the numbers were 57%, in towns 53%, and in rural areas 54%.
Those most likely to pick a decrease were in towns (10%), followed by Auckland (9%) and provincial cities (8%) and rural areas (8%.
Meanwhile in Christchurch 40% of locals are picking prices to stay the same.
The survey also measured the perceived impact, on house prices, of 5 price influencers; foreign investors, local investors, immigrants, Central & Local Government and banks. Participants were asked to rank these on a scale of 0 to 10 with 0 being no impact and 10 being the highest impact.
Foreign Investors were rated as having the largest impact (7), followed by banks (6.2) and domestic investors (6), immigrants (5.6 and lastly Central and Local Government (5.3).
“While people seem to differ on the causes, a significant proportion of them aren’t buying recent talk of an imminent crash and the large majority of people also share our view that a sharp price correction in the housing market is unlikely,” said Church.
“That would tend to confirm our view that the current price slow-down in the Auckland property market is being driven by the Reserve Banks LVR restrictions, rather than any loss of confidence in the Auckland market”.
