But nervous buyers are opting to wait and see what the property market will do
For the first time in a while, a window has opened in Hawke’s Bay’s property market for first-home buyers to enter, real estate agents said.
This opportunity, according to Stuart Christensen, Tremains central region general manager, was created by decreased property values and lower interest levels caused by rising mortgage interest rates.
“When the market does turn again, it will happen really quickly. But right now, I think first-home buyers have a window to get there,” Christensen told NZ Herald.
Last year, New Zealand’s average house prices suffered the largest fall in 15 years, the QV House Price Index showed.
House prices fell 13.4% in Hastings and 11.6% in Napier, two among the top-five biggest regional price drops across the country.
Despite this opportunity, turnout at open homes was reduced, as nervous buyers opted to wait and see what the property market would do.
“The numbers of buyers coming through for inspections are less. We’re not getting 20 or 30 buyers at open homes anymore,” Christensen said.
Sue Walters, from Property Brokers, said her company sold nearly 90 properties, a decline on previous years.
“Most of them took a little longer to sell than we were used to during a boom time, so people were quite anxious,” Walters said. “People were quite anxious, we had to start getting price reductions or adjustments last year.”
She said it’s been tough with fewer investors in the market.
Christensen said house prices in Hawke’s Bay experienced a massive growth in 2020-2021 as “the market went ballistic” and the correction was inevitable.
And despite the market going through a quiet period, there is still demand.
“There’s a lot of homes to look at at the moment, and we certainly don’t feel like there’s nothing available,” Rachel Dickinson, a prospective buyer, told NZ Herald. “If we saw a place we wanted, we would look at doing a subject to sell [offer].”
Dickinson was worried, though, that “subject to sell” would be risky even in an acknowledged buyers’ market.
“Sometimes it’s an advantage to be a cash buyer,” she said. “We have missed out on buying before, so it might be that we choose to sell our place first. So that we can come in as a cash buyer and have more security to get the property we want.”
Kadesha Whyte, who is checking out an open home in Taradale, Napier, is in the fortunate position of being a cash buyer.
“We just felt we needed to get into that position of being a cash buyer rather than subject to sale,” Whyte said. “It took us almost three months to sell and the price jumped a couple of times.”
Like many others, the mother of three has experienced the ups and downs of selling in the current market.
“We had a few moments when we thought ‘it’s never going to sell’ or ‘how much will we have to drop the price?’” she said. “We were in the high $600,000 and then dropped down to a low $600,000, but really, it’s just coming down everywhere. You have to meet the market.”
The market is improving slowly but surely, agents said.
Walters said the market is much more normal now.
“It’s not devastating. It’s not terrible. And it’s not a hopeless exercise to have a house on the market,” she said.
Christensen said now’s the time for first-home buyers to act.
“Make sure you do your homework and get your pre-approval done. Then just go out shopping,” he told NZ Herald.
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