At least seven of the city’s hospitality hotspots have come off and on to the commercial property market in the past few months, though those in the know say such activity is not that unusual.
The Bog, The Tart Tin, Ironic on George and Pizza Bar have all been sold, while upscale restaurants Tītī, Moiety and Catalyst have been listed for sale.
ABC Business Sales Otago business broker and hospitality consultant Jason Marshall, the agent for five of the listings, said the hospitality market was "not seeing anything that's massively unusual".
If anything, the number of businesses changing hands was "pretty standard".
Hospitality businesses sold on a reasonably regular basis, but tended to take a bit longer at this end of the country, he said.
Businesses were not all listing one day and selling the next — The Tart Tin had been on the market for a year, whereas The Bog was listed for about three or four months.
Dunedin was "definitely seeing an upturn in economic activity" recently.
"Certainly from what we see, we're getting a lot of inquiry from the North Island about people looking to move south.
"They're over the crime, they're over the traffic, they're over the s..... weather," Mr Marshall said.
Inquiries were coming out of Auckland as well as Wellington, as some people looked to do their own thing after public sector job cuts and redundancies, he said.
They were getting good inquiries from vendors considering listing, buyers looking to buy and current operators looking to expand.
New ideas and fresh energy coming into the industry was good news and Dunedin could do with more top-quality venues to complement what the city already had, he said.
Everything had a life cycle and sometimes people felt tired and wanted a change of scene after spending many years in hospitality, he said.
"Variety is the spice of life, is it not?"
Business South chief executive Mike Collins said the movement in the hospitality market did not come as a surprise to him, and agreed there was "quite a lot of interest" coming from out of town.
He had heard from real estate agents there was up to 30% of online listings for properties in Otago coming from outside the region.
"Out of Wellington and Auckland, there's just the hustle and bustle and the different lifestyle — people are trying to get down and create a new start.
"So I think Dunedin's pretty attractive, and across Otago is attractive for that."
The exodus from the bigger centres to the regions created an opportunity which would be important to leverage, he said.
Tītī co-owner and executive chef Hannes Bareiter said they had been working on another project for some time, and wanted to slow down and have a break.
The new business would be smaller and "a lot about dessert and happiness" and was expected to be up and running early next year.
They had owned Tītī for five years and had placed it on the market with the idea of selling it, but were not in any rush to do so.
Mr Bareiter said he had heard of people from the North Island looking at moving down to Dunedin, which was "definitely understandable".
"I think hospitality, and particularly in Auckland, it's really hard.
"There's a lot of compeTītīon ... I think you can certainly have a nicer life down here."
