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Brad Olsen: Infometrics Principal Economist on national house prices declining in 2024 · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from Newstalks'd be follow this
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  Speaker 2: Now. It apparently takes an average of fifty days nowadays
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  Speaker 2: to sellar house in New Zealand, and prices are still
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  Speaker 2: largely flat. Inflementary Infametrix principal economist Brad Olson's with me. Now, Hey, Brad,
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  Speaker 2: good evening. Okay, so what's the market actually doing? Is
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  Speaker 2: it volatile or has it settled into a kind of
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  Speaker 2: a flat space.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I mean it's broadly pretty flat at the moment,
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  Speaker 3: I think. I mean, there's was a little bit of
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  Speaker 3: evidence in the data that we got today from the
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  Speaker 3: Real Estate Institute suggesting that maybe there've been a little
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  Speaker 3: bit of a pop higher in prices in the month
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  Speaker 3: of September, But to be fair, that would be the
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  Speaker 3: first time we'd seen a monthly increase since April, so
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  Speaker 3: nearly half a year. Realistically, that means you've had six
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  Speaker 3: months of down and then one month of up, so
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  Speaker 3: really you're not going anywhere fast on the price front.
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  Speaker 3: I think the thing that gets me hither when we
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  Speaker 3: look through the housing market at the moment, and this
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  Speaker 3: is going to be the challenge for sellers particularly Not
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  Speaker 3: only is it taking fifty days on a seasonally basis
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  Speaker 3: to sell a house, but there's about half a year's
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  Speaker 3: worth of house sales currently sitting on the market unsolved.
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  Speaker 3: So there's a lot of choice out there. Good if
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  Speaker 3: you're one of those limited number of buyers, but not
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  Speaker 3: so good if you're trying to sell a house, because
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  Speaker 3: you're competing with everyone else to sell it.
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  Speaker 2: So I mean that obviously drives prices down, right, So
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  Speaker 2: should we expect prices to continue to fall?
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  Speaker 3: What we are seeing at the moment is that the
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  Speaker 3: number of houses left on the market is high, but
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  Speaker 3: ever so slightly starting to either decrease or sort of
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  Speaker 3: track sideways. So I think we're likely to see house
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  Speaker 3: prices be fairly subdued. And I say that because you
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  Speaker 3: could see a few months of ups and a few
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  Speaker 3: months of downs at different points. But realistically, I don't
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  Speaker 3: think that you're going to see a whole art lot.
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  Speaker 3: And that's sort of the big one. Because, yes, interest
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  Speaker 3: rates are coming down, which of course should stimulate a
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  Speaker 3: bit more buyer activity, but realistically there's still a lot
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  Speaker 3: of people out there who are trying to sell a house,
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  Speaker 3: So for the moment, still more in the buyer's hands
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  Speaker 3: than in the sealers.
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  Speaker 2: Are you seeing that one month of price increases as
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  Speaker 2: a bit of a shift.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, it's a little bit too early to read into it.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, is it coincidences at the start of something new.
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  Speaker 3: One month's worth of data probably doesn't tell us. It
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  Speaker 3: could be a little bit of it coming through, because
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  Speaker 3: you've definitely heard a lot of people who are talking
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  Speaker 3: with a lot more optimism in the housing market. But
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  Speaker 3: I think we'll want to wait and see. Regardless, I
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  Speaker 3: don't think we're about to see, you know, the housing
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  Speaker 3: market really perk up. It's likely to just be sort
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  Speaker 3: of hovering for a little while.
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  Speaker 2: Brad, what are you picking for the inflation number tomorrow?
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  Speaker 3: I think we're at two point two two point three,
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  Speaker 3: so sort of in that ballpark regardless. I mean, the
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  Speaker 3: numbers are likely to look a lot better in a sense,
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  Speaker 3: which is certainly encouraging. It's one of those things though
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  Speaker 3: part of that has been driven by the likes of
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  Speaker 3: petrol and similar so jury's out as to where we're
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  Speaker 3: going from here. But realistically, I think we're in a
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  Speaker 3: much better spot, and that's encouraging news for the economy,
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  Speaker 3: more interest rate reductions on the way, so better things
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  Speaker 3: around the corner.
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  Speaker 2: Good stuff. Yeah, you can't be more happy about it, Brad.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Brad Olsen, principal economist and Informetrics.
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