Demand is outstripping supply for high end properties
Buyers are acting decisively in the high end property market in Auckland with sales last month at the top end of the scale and prices increasing.
The latest monthly report from leading New Zealand estate agents Barfoot & Thompson also shows that there are fewer properties in this sector on the market so demand is outstripping supply.
The number of homes for sale at the end of July was at its lowest level in seven years with the firm selling 998 homes for an average sales price of $591,444.
‘For a July, this number of sales was at the very top end of the scale for recent years. At the end of the month we had only 3,975 properties on our books, the lowest number since late 2005,’ said Peter Thompson, managing director of Barfoot & Thompson.
‘The low number of properties for sale is being caused by high turnover, not by the number of people listing properties for sale. In July we listed 1295 properties, 23.3% more than in the same month last year. However, demand in July was exceptionally strong and we sold 28.3% more homes in July than in the same month last year,’ he explained.
‘The number of homes on our books at month’s end has now fallen each month for five months. It has created a market in which people are prepared to act decisively. Prices are increasing, but they are not spiralling up. What is out of the ordinary is the number of properties being sold for this time of the year, and the speed at which they are being sold,’ he added.
In July the average sales price edged up by a little more than $2,000 over that for June. In the past three months the price difference between the May and July average price is modest at $9,000, or a movement of less than 2%, the firm’s data shows.
Sales of properties in the $1 million plus category continued to feature, with 82 properties selling in this price range in July compared to 50 in July last year.
Thompson said that while high value properties attracted most attention, about half of all the sales of properties in Auckland were for less than $500,000. In July some 498 properties for less than $500,000 were sold, up 8.7% on those for June.