Government to wait until next year to act on housing crisis, despite skyrocketing prices

There was a significant increase in the number of houses sold in November despite inventory dropping over 16 percent, but the Government is leaving any action on the housing crisis until the new year.

The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) released their data for last month on Friday, which showed house prices have hit new records.

The median national median house price is now $749,000 – an increase of 18.5 percent from the same time last year.

Jacob Jenkins and Jessie Wrigglesworth were able to secure their first home on Friday for $860,000.

“It’s been really emotional – an emotional rollercoaster. The budget has definitely had to increase a little bit,” she told Newshub.

The auction was the end of what’s been a stressful struggle.

“[We] definitely [had] a few shocks of thinking we were going well over what we should’ve, thinking we were paying a good price – and then it goes for $300,000 over that… those were the really tough ones.”

The frenzied housing market prompted Finance Minister Grant Robertson to call on the Reserve Bank for help.

In November he wrote to Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr proposing to add house prices to the central bank’s remit.

“The Reserve Bank is only one player in this, but everybody needs to be involved if we are going to make sure there is an affordable housing market,” Robertson said.