New house sale listings are falling with sale inventory levels in Auckland at a four year low as the spring buying season approaches, realestate.co.nz says.
In it latest monthly property report, realestate.co.nz CEO Alistair Helm said the property asking price, number of new listings and level of inventory all fell in July from June during the middle of the traditionally slow winter period.
The nationwide asking price for new listings fell 3% to NZ$403,474 in July from June, despite the market appearing to favour sellers over buyers, Helm said.
Meanwhile there were 8,966 new listings on the website during July, down 2% from June and down 15% from July 2010.
Realestate.co.nz's measure of inventory of unsold houses on the market showed it would take 38.5 weeks of equivalent sales to clear the market, down 8% from June and 18% from a year ago.
"Auckland remains the epicenter of this trend and now sees a situation where available inventory of property for sale is the lowest seen since this recent property malaise began back in 2007," Helm said.
"Auckland currently has just over 5½ months of available inventory based on the recent rate of sale, not since September 2007 has the region seen this level – the highest level of inventory was recorded in June 2008 at just over 13 months," he said.
See Helm's comments below:
The property market is edging toward the Spring period – a time traditionally when more buyer activity appears at open homes and new properties appear on the market. This year unlike the past couple sees a challenging set of circumstances. New listings are in short supply, not just in the major cities but now right around the country. Matched to this and as a function of this and the upturn in sales the level of inventory of unsold property on the market is edging down – nationally below the long-term average.
This low level of supply, if not met by a rise in supply in the short term could result in either or both price pressure upwards or disillusioned buyers exiting the market.
This trend of falling inventory off the back of rising sales and shortages of new listings began a couple of months ago in Auckland and then spread out through the major metropolitan areas into provincial NZ.
Auckland remains the epicenter of this trend and now sees a situation where available inventory of property for sale is the lowest seen since this recent property malaise began back in 2007. Auckland currently has just over 5½ months of available inventory based on the recent rate of sale, not since September 2007 has the region seen this level – the highest level of inventory was recorded in June 2008 at just over 13 months.
Whilst shortage of supply matched to low inventory and rising sales usually sees pressure on prices, the asking price for July showed what is a traditional fall – seasonally adjusted it was down 1.6% indicating that sellers new to the market are not being wildly optimistic in their expectations – potentially keener to sell quickly than inflate expectations.
Asking Price
The truncated mean asking price for all new listings in July fell significantly from $415,053 in June to $403,474. On a seasonally adjusted basis the asking price fell 1.6% in the month indicating a continued degree of caution amongst sellers.
The overall trend of the past 2 years continues to show a slow but steady strength in asking price expectation.
New Listings
The level of new listings coming onto the market in July fell again to 8,966. This represented a 15% year-on-year decline but a marginal 1% seasonally adjusted rise from June.
On a 12 month moving basis the number of new listings in the past year totals 124,228 as compared 145,733 for the same period a year ago – a fall of 15%.
Inventory
The level of unsold houses on the market at the end of July continued to fall from prior months. July reported 45,674 down from 47,738 in June and 48,352 in May. The current inventory is now well below the long term average. The winter season traditionally sees a reduction in new listings, this when seen against a strengthening of sale over the past 3 months is likely to see inventory levels continue to fall as Spring approaches.
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