Harcourts, Barfoot at odds

Earlier this week, Barfoot and Thompson said sales figures dropped a bit in September and there was no mad rush to get in before the new rules came into force.

But Harcourts says it saw buyers willing to pay more to get their loans sorted before banks had to start restricting their low-deposit lending.

Harcourts’ figures show the average house in Auckland last month sold for $640,739 – up  7.7% from August.

It was the highest average price the agency had reported all year and was 17% more than the same time in 2012.

“We expected a market reaction before the LVR restrictions came in, and this has been a significant one. Next month’s statistics will show whether there will be any cooling in prices, as is the Government’s intention.”

New listings were down 11.2% on the same time in 2012 but sales were up almost 10%.

At current transaction levels, there is not enough housing stock to last more than 3.6 months.

“Auckland is where many people live by necessity for employment reasons. We don’t have enough houses and buyers are continuing to be frustrated by massive demand and low supply. LVR restrictions have made an already difficult market even more so for many Aucklanders”