Property

Country lifestyle popularity gaining on city life: survey

The perception that living in a country or rural community holds many advantages over city life is attracting young families and professionals employed full time within the city, according to a new survey by allrealestate.co.nz.

Wednesday, August 01st 2007

This growing popularity of country living has also triggered a sharp shift in demand, with the website experiencing a 20.17% growth in the number of its rural/lifestyle listings.

“Lifestyle blocks are proving to be a good investment delivering people the best of both worlds; country living while still remaining relatively close to cities or towns,” says Shaun Di Gregorio, allrealestate.co.nz’s general manager.

The survey revealed Kiwi’s preferences for living on a country property are dominated by lifestyle and environmental considerations rather than the opportunity to use land productively.

Economic considerations were also appealing with 17.17% of Kiwi’s declaring cheaper housing and the reduced cost of living as a major incentive to relocate to a rural community.

Di Gregorio believes advances in technology with mobile communications and broadband Internet have provided greater freedom to work from home rather than needing to be 100% office based.

“We see this trend continuing to gather momentum as technology becomes even more sophisticated, thereby connecting people more remotely and reducing the disadvantage of daily peak hour travel for a growing number of people,” he says.

“There is so much choice today about where and how we live our lives and property buyers have become increasingly diverse.”

Heartland Bank - Online 6.69
SBS FirstHome Combo 6.74
Wairarapa Building Society 6.95
Unity 6.99
Co-operative Bank - First Home Special 7.04
ICBC 7.05
China Construction Bank 7.09
BNZ - Classic 7.24
ASB Bank 7.24
ANZ Special 7.24
TSB Special 7.24
Unity First Home Buyer special 6.45
Heartland Bank - Online 6.45
China Construction Bank 6.75
TSB Special 6.75
ICBC 6.75
ANZ Special 6.79
ASB Bank 6.79
AIA - Go Home Loans 6.79
Kiwibank Special 6.79
BNZ - Classic 6.79
Unity 6.79
Westpac Special 6.39
China Construction Bank 6.40
ICBC 6.49
SBS Bank Special 6.55
Kiwibank Special 6.55
BNZ - Classic 6.55
Co-operative Bank - Owner Occ 6.55
ASB Bank 6.55
AIA - Go Home Loans 6.55
TSB Special 6.59
Kainga Ora 6.99
SBS FirstHome Combo 6.19
AIA - Back My Build 6.19
ANZ Blueprint to Build 7.39
Credit Union Auckland 7.70
ICBC 7.85
Heartland Bank - Online 7.99
Pepper Money Essential 8.29
Co-operative Bank - Owner Occ 8.40
Co-operative Bank - Standard 8.40
First Credit Union Standard 8.50
Kiwibank 8.50

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