[Karoline]

Don't buy because house prices will drop 10 percent in the next three years!

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10116770

Great news for wanna-be house owners!

:clap

I think the market in NZ has been too crazy (as they were in the Netherlands too). The house prices should be more in level with the salaries so an avarage income can afford an avarage house.

cheers
Karoline

[Moorf]

But surely it would still be better to buy than rent as 3 yrs of $350/wk would be c. $55,000 down the drain :eek so you'd need to have bought a house over $550k to lose out..... ?

[dave k]

I've seen evidence in this "cooling off" already in Wellington.
I think it'll probably be a good time to buy towards the back end of this year...not that there's ever a truly good or bad time to buy...but that's when I'll be making inroads I reckon.
And....well, of course rentals haven't gone up!! People generally can't pay more than what landlords are asking at the moment until wages fall in line!

[Karoline]

Jerome and i have found a nice place in Te Haumi/Paihia for 80 NZ dollars a week. We are sharing the kitchen with the owners but have our own bathroom. Advantage is that we don't need to buy a lot of stuff and we'll be able to save quite a lot for a while (hopefully). Ofcourse later on we wld like to have a place for our own, but we don't need much, max rent 150 to 200.
We'd be looking at a section to build our own house on. But at the moment we would not have enough money to buy land anyway.
We probably need at least three years (or more!) to get the money together... :mrgreen:

Karoline

[debnjohn]

"Bryan Thomson, chief executive of the 170-office Harcourts, hit back at criticism of the housing market, and particularly the Reserve Bank's attempts to cool it.

"Moves by the bank to slow the market by lifting interest rates appear to be having little effect apart from the impact on our exporters," he said. "The residential property market is driven by several factors, including job security and income."
Sour grapes? I like the last bit about the market being driven up by income. All that I've read so far has indicated that income is not keeping up.

For those of us lucky enough to have some equity from e.g. a UK house sale, the cost of rent can be offset against interest earned. Meanwhile, hopefully ( :hopeso ) house prices will cool and the NZ dollar will weaken. The latter would be most appreciated :P
John.

[leslie]

talk about self-fulfilling prophecy. true, if we all stop buying the market will drop but so will our savings thanks to rent hikes that always accompany housing market stagnancy. madre mia