Mexican stand-off in housing market

ASB Bank chief economist Nick Tuffley says “a degree of Mexican stand-off remains in the market; buyers and sellers are having difficulty meeting in the middle, so turnover continues to decline.”

REINZ data out yesterday shows that while the median price has held firm at $345,000, turnover is way down compared to this time last year.

Added to that the REINZ figures show the number of days to sell has increased to 49.
Deutsche Bank says that the days-to-sell number hasn’t been at this level since 2002 and if sales activity remains at these extremely low levels, then the days to say statistic should rise substantially.

ASB’s Tuffley says the market is splitting into different groups based around sale price.
Fewer properties in the less than $400,000 bracket are selling than previously, meanwhile sales of houses worth more than $1 million are strong.