ZB ZB
Live now
Start time
Playing for
End time
Listen live
Listen to NAME OF STATION
Up next
Listen live on
ZB

Andrew Dickens: Boom Times in Slow Times

Publish Date
Wed, 2 Oct 2019, 12:26PM
Dunedin and regional NZ booming while main centres stagnant (Photo/NZ Herald)

Andrew Dickens: Boom Times in Slow Times

Publish Date
Wed, 2 Oct 2019, 12:26PM

Can you hear it. The chatter of real estate.

It’s been a bit quiet all winter, the Auckland market dropped 2.4 per cent,  but now it’s starting to buzz just a bit. There are reports of busy open homes and houses going above CV.  Better weather, low interest rates and a pent up pressure will do that.

New figures for the year to last month show the biggest house price rises were in Central Hawkes bay, up 16.7 per cent and Manawatu/Whanganui up 16.3 per cent. Nationally prices are up 2.72 per cent

The biggest market is in the 750,00 to 1 million dollar band which makes up 44.5 per cent of the national market.

Isn’t interesting that people are coming back to the market just as the worst business confidence figures are out.  But that just shows you the vagaries in emotion.

But what really struck my eye was that Dunedin is the biggest mover in house prices amongst all our cities, up over 12 per cent in the year.

Having just spent 9 days in Central Otago, reading the ODT I can tell you there’s a buzz about the whole region

A week ago the ODT reported that  Dunedin's GDP growth was 2.6% last year, job growth was up 8% and residential building consents up 3.3% as at June 2019, according to Enterprise Dunedin.

There’s been a 4.2% increase in the number of people enrolled with local health providers which says the population is growing.

The story had a picture of the Fleetwood Mac concert at Forsyth Barr and the implication was the so called white elephant stadium was helping paint a picture that Dunedin was booming and becoming more and more attractive.

Well to tell the truth it always has been.  Back in the day when I was in management I was looking at the pay of our sales reps in Otago and seeing that it was exactly the same as the pay we were giving our reps in Auckland.  But of course the cost of living was dramatically lower.  If you’re a teacher or anyone else covered by collective agreements, you get the same pay in Dunedin as any other city so why not stretch your dollar in a funky province.

But as the slow rebalancing of our population spread continues it comes with warnings. Local authorities have to plan ahead to avoid the pitfalls our bigger cities have struck.

I saw that in Queenstown where debate rages over the struggling infrastructure serving the tourists and the residents.  And I saw that in Wanaka where the surging population means a drive to increase tourism which means there’s been aa vicious debate over developing the airport between the newbies who need jobs and the nimbies who think Wanaka can stay the same as it always has.

It’s all proof that even in slow times change is always happening

Take your Radio, Podcasts and Music with you