Iran war<\/a> had led to significant increases in petrol prices and wholesale interest rates.<\/p>\n\u201cIf higher fuel prices continue for any sustained period, they will undermine New Zealand\u2019s economic recovery and hit consumer confidence,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn tandem with upward pressure on mortgage rates, international events could weaken housing market demand in coming weeks and lead to renewed downward pressure on house sales and prices.\u201d<\/p>\n
On an annual basis, the HPI indicated the housing market value nationwide had no movement year-on-year, REINZ said.<\/p>\n
In Auckland, the value decreased 1.1% year-on-year, while the HPI value increased by 0.7% outside Auckland.<\/p>\n
Southland retained the top spot for HPI percentage changes over the 12 months ending February 2026. Prices for Invercargill city were up 6.6% in a year.<\/p>\n
Canterbury and Bay of Plenty came second and third, respectively, for annual percentage movement.<\/p>\n
Christchurch and Tauranga rose 3.9% and 2.9% respectively, across the year.<\/p>\n
Kiernan noted prices were still lower than a year ago across much of the North Island, including falls of 3.6% in Gisborne and 2.9% in Wellington.<\/p>\n
Tasman was the only South Island region showing an annual price fall.<\/p>\n
Sales volumes recovered much of the ground lost in January, rebounding 6.6% (based on Infometrics seasonal adjustment).<\/p>\n
Sales numbers were marginally higher than in February 2025, up 0.3%.<\/p>\n
ANZ economist Matthew Galt noted the monthly increase was markedly stronger than the recent trend.<\/p>\n
House prices had been declining at an average pace of 0.1% per month, over the past six months, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, we are doubtful that this represents a shift in the underlying direction in the market. Other indicators of housing demand are not showing the same strength, including sales volumes (which remain a touch below their long-run average) and days to sell (which lengthened further in February).\u201d<\/p>\n
He also noted the February data referred to the period before the conflict in the Middle East broke out.<\/p>\n
\u201cNervousness about how the conflict could impact the economy here will add to the sense of caution among buyers in the coming months.\u201d<\/p>\n
Liam Dann is business editor-at-large for the New Zealand Herald. He is a senior writer and columnist, and also presents and produces videos and podcasts. He joined the Herald in 2003.<\/p>\n
Stay ahead with the latest market moves, corporate updates, and economic insights by subscribing to our Business newsletter<\/a> \u2013 your essential weekly round-up of all the business news you need.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThis assessment of a more stable market is reinforced by less negative trends for house prices and the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3225,95,6326,138,3105,638,6750,30271,2964,10053,78,5345,14995,700,225,48299,111,139,69,12937,6115,25594,12000,1305,23554,5652,178057,44094,1237,1530],"class_list":["post-331593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-according","tag-and","tag-biggest","tag-business","tag-data","tag-estate","tag-february","tag-figures","tag-half","tag-house","tag-in","tag-increase","tag-institute","tag-latest","tag-market","tag-monthly","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-prices","tag-real","tag-reinz","tag-rose","tag-show","tag-showed","tag-signs","tag-stabilising","tag-tentative","tag-two","tag-years"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}