Source: MIL-OSI Submissions
Source: CoreLogic
Market momentum confirmed in the lead-up to COVID-19 lockdown, however all eyes now turn to post-lockdown activity
According to the CoreLogic QV April 2020 House Price Index results out today, momentum in the property market continued right up to the level four COVID-19 enforced lockdown. What’s less clear is how property values have performed through April. With sales activity stalling through the month, we won’t get a reliable measure on home prices until activity resumes under the more market friendly level 3 restrictions.
Technically, property values across NZ grew by 7.1% in the year to the end of April 2020 demonstrating strong market fundamentals prior to the COVID-19 disruption. For Auckland the annual growth rate was 4.5%, while Dunedin remained the main centre with the greatest momentum of 20.7% annual growth.
Index results as at 4 May 2020
Notes: The CoreLogic QV HPI uses a rolling three month collection of sales data, based on sales agreement date. This has always been the case and ensures a large sample of sales data is used to measure value change over time. This does mean the measure is less reactive to recent market movements but offers a very smooth trend over time. Also, due to having agent and non-agent sales included the index provides the most comprehensive measure of property value change over the longer term.
With the COVID-19 enforced level 4 lockdown rendering property settlements that require physical movement of people unlawful, April will have a significantly reduced number of sales which means the latest index will be dominated by sales from before the lockdown.
