New high for residential property prices in Auckland
Average residential property prices in Auckland, New Zealand, have soared to a new high and demand is pushing up values, new data published today (Monday 05 November) reveals.
The average price of a home in Auckland, New Zealand, broke through the $600,000 ceiling for the first time last month, setting a record average price of $618,707.
This is an increase of nearly $33,000 or 5.6% on last month’s average price, and is 4.4% higher than the previous record price of $592,396, recorded in August this year, according to the latest data from Barfoot & Thompson.
‘October was one of the most active selling months we have ever experienced. It was a month when buyer demand finally broke through the constraints buyers were imposing on themselves that had seen the average price move in a $10,000 band between $582,000 and $592,000 for five months,’ said Wendy Alexander, chief executive officer of Barfoot & Thompson.
‘We experienced extremely competitive bidding at auctions, and a very high success rate under the auction hammer. It was a case of demand far out stripping the number of properties up for sale,’ she explained.
Sales for the month at 1,081 were up 11.6% on those for September and up 48.7% on those for the same month last year.
‘Even though we listed 1645 new homes during the month, our highest number of new listings in 31 months, and the highest in an October for three years, it was insufficient to meet buyer demand, particularly at the top end of the market,’ explained Alexander.
‘Sales values in excess of $1 million were a feature of October’s activity, and we sold 119 homes in this price category. This was the highest number of million dollar homes we have ever sold in one month,’ she added.
The firm also reports that business is booming at the higher end of the market. ‘For the first 10 months of the year we have sold 763 homes for more than $1 million, which is 64.4% higher than for the same period last year,’ said Alexander.
‘The only time we have ever sold more than 100 homes for in excess of one million dollars in a month previously was at the height of 2007’s sales activity, and at that time the average monthly selling price was $564,000,’ she pointed out.
‘At the end of the month we had 3835 properties on our books, our third lowest number in more than a decade,’ she added.