Listings hit 11-month high in Auckland

Wednesday 3rd March 2010

More Auckland home owners are looking to sell after an 11-month hiatus when the worst recession in 18 years sapped people’s appetite for big ticket spending.

Last month, there were 1,714 new listings for Barfoot & Thompson, the city’s largest real estate firm, taking the total number of homes on the firm’s books to 6,247, the highest level since March last year.

The firm boosted the number of sales 7.4% to 626 from January, and it was up 12% from February 2009. Still, that leaves 544 properties that were either sold by another real estate agency or taken off the market.

“The main driver of buying activity remains owner occupiers, either trading up or moving into the Auckland area, and for these people, concerns about any changes in government policy around housing or any modest interest rate increase are not major deterrents,” said managing director Peter Thompson.

Nationally, house sales fell to close to 20-year lows in January as uncertainty over property tax changes and historically high unemployment dented people’s confidence in the market after its revival last year underpinned the economy’s recovery.

Thompson hinted high property prices may be a thing of the past, saying the “balanced state of the market” meant sellers need to ensure they sell at an appropriate price.

Auckland house prices rose 3.2% to $521,323 last month from January and were up 1.7% from the same month in 2009. The price is a historically high level for the month of February.

The real estate agency’s property management division recorded a 2.7% fall in average weekly rentals to $390.

Businesswire.co.nz

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