{"id":616622,"date":"2026-09-30T18:46:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T18:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/616622\/"},"modified":"2026-09-30T18:46:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T18:46:10","slug":"centrix-data-show-financial-hardship-rising-again-among-kiwis-but-mortgage-stress-eases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/616622\/","title":{"rendered":"Centrix data show financial hardship rising again among Kiwis but mortgage stress eases"},"content":{"rendered":"\u201cFinancial hardship has started to rise again, after easing earlier in 2026.\u201d<\/p>\n
Personal loans are now the fastest-growing source of financial hardship, but mortgages remain the largest contributor \u2013 accounting for 38% of cases.<\/p>\n
Personal loan hardship volumes have more than doubled since 2023 and are 46% higher year on year.<\/p>\n
Figures from Inland Revenue show more than half a billion dollars ($537.9 million) was withdrawn from KiwiSaver for financial hardship reasons in the 12 months to June 2026.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the number of people behind on their mortgage repayments fell to the lowest level since December 2022, Centrix said.<\/p>\n
Mortgage arrears dropped to 1.19% of the active population, with 19,600 home loans reported as past due \u2013 13% lower than a year ago.<\/p>\n
Consumer arrears held steady at 10.74% of the credit-active population in August, with 424,000 people behind on repayments.<\/p>\n
Overall arrears are now 11.2% lower than a year ago.<\/p>\n
Lacey said the year-on-year improvement in arrears is \u201cencouraging\u201d.<\/p>\n
Company liquidations remain elevated, with 3105 recorded during the year to August.<\/p>\n
Liquidations are up 14% compared with a year ago on a rolling 12-month basis.<\/p>\n
Construction accounted for 21% of company insolvencies during August, followed by hospitality (15%) and property, leasing and hiring (12%).<\/p>\n
Lacey said business conditions continue to vary by sector.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe construction sector shows early signs of improvement, with annual liquidation activity down 1% and larger declines across several building-related subsectors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis coincides with June-quarter GDP [gross domestic product] data showing construction activity increased 2.7% and made the largest upward contribution to economic growth, while hospitality and retail continue to record higher annual liquidation volumes.\u201d<\/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":"\u201cFinancial hardship has started to rise again, after easing earlier in 2026.\u201d Personal loans are now the fastest-growing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616623,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3225,6030,3471,138,3013,82880,3105,60827,219,30271,1644,71,33184,807,16400,111,139,4061,69,1436,801,1305,1355,3405],"class_list":["post-616622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-according","tag-again","tag-among","tag-business","tag-but","tag-centrix","tag-data","tag-eases","tag-economy","tag-figures","tag-financial","tag-from","tag-hardship","tag-kiwis","tag-mortgage","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-number","tag-nz","tag-rise","tag-rising","tag-show","tag-starting","tag-stress"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616622","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=616622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616622\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}