Listings down, asking price eases

The website reported 8010 new listings last month, down 6% from 2012 and a drop of 40% compared to November 2013.

It was the lowest number of new listings in seven years.

At the same time, asking prices eased to a level last reported in June 2013. The national seasonally-adjusted truncated mean asking price dropped 5.7% from November to $451,448.

Record asking prices were reported in Canterbury, where the average asking price of $443,750 was 14% up on December 2012, and Taranaki, where asking prices increased 22% on the year before to an average $344,910.

Auckland’s average asking price dropped marginally to $656,702. Wellington’s fell 2.7% to $445,351.

Northland had the largest increase in asking price, up 6.5% from November to $422,779 last month.

The most significant drops in listings were seen in Taranaki and Northland. Auckland recorded 1897 new listings in the month, down 8% from December 2012.

But new listings for apartments were up 8% year-on-year. The truncated mean asking price of new apartment listings rose to $422,712.

Lifestyle block listings dropped 31% compared to November, with an average asking price of $681,453 – up almost 10% on the same time a year before.

The available listings on the site would take 26.3 weeks to sell at current turnover rates, well down on the long-term average of 37.