Buyers giving up: Survey

BNZ chief economist Tony Alexander said the survey suggested that prices would continue to rise and the shortage in the market would only get worse.

A net 5.1% of the agents who responded to the survey reported a drop in vendor requests for appraisals, signalling that the shortage of listings in the Auckland market in particular is unlikely to improve any time soon.

Alexander said new building was still not keeping pace, either. “The number of consents issued for the construction of new dwellings was not only well below the 10-year average of 22,000 in March at 17,397, that result was down from February’s 17,481.”

Alexander said the Reserve Bank move to require banks to hold more capital for lending above 80% of a property’s value had made things harder for first-time buyers and had put a premium on high-LVR interest rates.