Harcourts Ilse Evans No ‘Doom & Gloom’ Predictors

(PR.co.nz)

As Ilse Evans puts it, “It all feels a little back to normal in the real estate world, or just about. Open home numbers are confident and buyers are still looking and making buying decisions. There are always those one or two buyers that can’t wait to tell us that the market is about to come crashing down and we should all hide for cover (unless our owners will happily take a massive drop and then they are in)”.

Ilse says that stats from the month of Level 3 show a significant drop in the volume of sales, but with part of this accounting for Level 4 transactions, or lack of, and with people initially in Level 3 hesitant to get buying immediately, it is not a surprise at all. 

Yes, prices are a little softer, but once again to be expected, with a reduction in confidence from purchasers, with the concerns of economic effects, job layoffs etc. With these, and the real unknown for many of what the future brings, you can’t blame anyone for taking the ‘wait and see’ attitude.

Harcourts Cooper expect to see the market stats to show more softening as they play catch up to today’s market, but they don’t feel they will be in the double digits at all.

With maybe 5% so far, and maybe another around 5% as we set into the new norm, all that has happened is that prices have gone back to the end of 2019 levels. For many owners looking to buy and sell in the same market, or owners who have enjoyed the comfortable 10% increase seen over the last 12 months, even after this softening, they still can’t think of a safer investment than residential property.

As Ilse says, “As you can tell I am not a subscriber to the doom and gloom predictors, the general economists from overseas who don’t know the intricacies of how our New Zealand economy and property market interacts with the many facets that affect its value.

“However, I do put a lot of confidence in a well-seasoned local economist, Tony Alexander, likely the most well-known and respected one of our time, who provides many reasons why, although we will see job losses and a tougher economy for a period, we will only see moderate softening of houses prices and not an absolute bath as many buyers hope and wish for”, so for more information on Takapuna real estate, property appraisals Takapuna and selling my house please go to http://www.ilseevans.co.nz .

Media Release 22 June 2020.