Surface water and river flooding big risk for property prices

Property owners may see a fall in values in flood zones as risk understanding improves and is priced into the housing market.

The report findings have been pre-released from the RBNZ’s Financial Stability Report, which will be released tomorrow.

In the RBNZ’s exercise, it asked the big five banks to measure their exposure to river and floodwater risk in the Auckland region, although data and capability for assessing that at the national level is not as advanced as that for coastal flooding.

The banks used data from the Auckland Council mapping a 1-in-100 year flood zone aligned with a scenario where existing climate policies remain unchanged to 2050.