New growth cycle for Auckland

The SuperCity’s largest real estate agency kicked off 2020 with the highest number of sales in a January for four years.

While the 678 sales were down on December’s 779 sales, they were up by 3.8% on the 653 sales seen in January last year.

Barfoot & Thompson managing director Peter Thompson says it was an extremely confident start to the year, with strong sales, an increase in new listings and rising prices.

“Both the average and median prices were up on those for December last year, and buyers were active across all price segments and prepared to pay near record prices.”

While the average price for the month at $951,631 was in line with prices for the past three months, it was 2.6% ahead of last January’s average price of $927,181.

The biggest price movement was seen in the median price of $885,000, which was an increase of 2.3% on that of December and up by 6.9% on January 2019’s median price of $827,500.

Thompson says that January’s trading confirmed the signs seen in November and December trading, which pointed to the Auckland housing market entering a new growth cycle.

“Although new listings for the month at 1,080 were sound - and up 58% on those for December and 11.1% on January last year - the market is still tight in terms of choice.

“At month’s end we had 3,537 properties on our books, down 18.4% on the number in January last year and only on a par with the average number of listings for the previous three months.”

This number of listings at the end of January is the lowest they have been at the start of a year in four years, he says. “Given the level of interest being shown by buyers, now represents an excellent time for owners to list.”

Meanwhile, the rural and lifestyle markets experienced their best start to the year in three years, with strong sales numbers and excellent prices in January.

“The active markets led to a renewed interest in development land from those buyers unable to find an existing property that met their demands,” Thompson adds.

“Growing numbers attended auctions and open homes during the month. As with the metropolitan market, new listings, while increasing over those in late 2019, were insufficient to meet demand.”

The story told by Barfoot & Thompson’s January data reinforces the trend seen in the most recent REINZ data.

According to REINZ, Auckland saw a 31.7% year-on-year increase in sales and a 3.5% year-on-year increase in median house prices in December 2019.

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Highest sales in December for three years