Property market tightened further in June

NEW property listings throughout Otago mirrored the national trend by a decline in numbers, but asking prices continued to rise, as those in Central Otago, Queenstown and the rest of Otago were up more than 3% in June.

Analysts are picking regional prices will continue to tick over, despite some main centre declines.

New property listings for June fell in 15 of 19 regions around the country, a 9.9% decline on June last year, and the national asking price was down almost 4% at $646,231.

In May, separate Quotable Value data found the national average house value was up 1% on a year ago, at $678,000, but in June it slipped to $675,680.

Nationally, in June, there were a total 8136 new property listings. Otago listings were down 8.4% to 240 and Central Otago, Queenstown Lakes listings were down 2.3%, at 168, according to the Real Estate Institute’s realestate.co.nz data.

While new residential Otago listings declined, the average asking price rose 3.4% to $395,337 and Central Otago, Queenstown Lakes rose 3.7% to $901,539.

ASB economist Kim Mundy said the falling housing inventory was further tightening the ‘‘already tight housing markets around New Zealand’’.

‘‘Incoming legislation changes add to the considerable uncer tainty over the outlook for the housing market,’’ she said in a statement.

While the ban on foreign buyers was due to come into effect this month, its actual impact remained uncertain.

‘‘However, it appears the regional catchup in prices we’ve been experiencing of late is likely to continue for a while longer,’’ she said.

The spokeswoman for realestate.co, Vanessa Taylor, said new listings dropped around the North Island except Wellington, while in the South Island, three of the seven regions recorded new listings increases.

Data from the previous month showed there were many more buyers than sellers who intended being active in the property mar ket in the next 12 months.

‘‘We said at the time this would put increasing pressure on housing stock in the next 12 months.’’

Notable in June was the narrowing gap in asking prices between the Auckland and Central Otago, Queenstown Lakes regions.

In the Auckland region in June, asking prices fell 2.4% to $931,339 compared with the previous month while the Central Otago Queenstown Lakes region’s average asking price rose 3.7% to over $901,000.

‘‘The $30,000 difference speaks more about the individual strengths of an attractive lifestyle region and a major metropolitan hub,’’ she said.

❛ It appears the regional catchup in prices we’ve been experiencing of late is likely to continue for a while longer

ASB economist Kim Mundy