PHOTO: The REINZ May confidence report shows that properties took longer to sell and sales numbers were well below the same time last year. Photo credit: Getty.
Properties are taking longer to sell and prices are struggling to stabilise in the wake of COVID-19, a new property report shows.
According to a Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) May market confidence report, the nationwide median house price dropped $36,000 during the month, ending at $629,500, a drop of 9 percent between April and May. But compared to May 2019, it was 7 percent higher. Record median prices were achieved in three out of 16 regions: Waikato ($598,000), Taranaki ($426,000), and Tasman ($701,500).
Figures for the last week of May show properties took 35 percent longer to sell than a typical May month, and sales volumes were around 19 percent lower.
The number of days properties took to sell increased over the month, starting at 48 days and closing at 60 days. The region with the highest median number of days to sell was Gisborne at 81 days, for the week ending May 24. The region with the lowest number of days to sell was the West Coast, with a median of 21 days for the week ending May 17.
“Based on May data over the last three years, we’d expect median days to sell of around 39 days – we still have some way to go before this metric starts to return to a ‘normal’ level, the report said.
The number of properties sold jumped from 355 in the first week of May to 1372 in the final week. By comparison, historical May data shows that the number of properties sold in a typical week would be around 1700.
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