New Zealand house prices continue to rise, pushing through the last peak seen in late 2007. Residential values increased 7.6% during the past year, with a 2.8% rise over the past three months, according to data released by Quotable Value (QV) yesterday.
Dunedin values remained steady during the past three months, showing a 0.4% increase, but the average value was 4% up on last year's, at $285,500.
The wider Central Otago region was up 2.7% on a year ago at $300,100 and Queenstown was 4% up, at $636,700.
Christchurch was up 10.4% to $429,400 on a year ago, while Auckland city, just one of 19 Auckland sub-regions covered by QV, was up 13.4% at $760,900. QV operations manager Kerry Stewart said nationwide values had continued to increase, but only about half as quickly as they did during the years leading up to the 2007 market peak.
As with data released earlier this week by the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand, listing numbers are down and demand is pushing prices up, primarily in Auckland and Canterbury, but also in some Central Otago sub-regions, such as Queenstown.
However, Mr Stewart said Auckland values were increasing at a faster rate than they had before the previous peak. The strong increases were largely constrained to Auckland and Canterbury.
''Value increases across the rest of the country are still largely subdued.''
Christchurch is also suffering from a stock shortage, leading to upward pressure on prices.
''The rest of the country generally isn't suffering from such a shortage, so value increases are likely to remain modest,'' Mr Stewart said.
''The number of properties for sale is continuing to drop while demand remains strong,'' he said.
Dunedin QV valuer Tim Gibson said after what had been a promising first half of the year, property values in Dunedin stabilised this month.
However, there was good demand and multiple offers for properties in the lower to middle price brackets.
