AKA: housing affordability, housing supply, housing availability
Key notes
- Renters - we haven’t forgotten you! As house prices go up in price, so too do rental prices and vice versa.
- Remember that each Labour-led or National-led government has had coalition partners that share the successes, and the failures, with them. A full list of governments for this time range is at the bottom of this page.
- You can toggle the household income line on and off by clicking on 'Median Household Income' in the legend underneath the graphic.
Data sources
Data shown:
- Median house price in New Zealand from REINZ monthly reports.
- Median household incomes as at May of each year, from the HLFS (Household Labour Force Survey). This data starts in 1998, which is why our house prices also start in 1998.
Full data:
Frequency:
- House prices = monthly
- Household income = annually for the June quarter (May midpoint)
Updated:
- House prices = ~2 week delay
- Household incomes = ~5 week delay
Last update:
- House prices November = 17 December 2024
- Household incomes = 8 August 2024
Next update:
- House prices December = mid-January 2025
- Household incomes = August 2025
Why this KPI?
- When people talk about the housing issue, they are usually talking about the supply/availability of housing, the price of that housing, or both.
- Generally, as supply decreases relative to demand, prices increase, and as supply increases, prices come down, stay stable, or increase at a slower rate more closely aligned with inflation.
- The reverse also generally holds true. When house prices decrease, the supply of new housing decreases as developers/investors can’t make satisfactory returns as easily, and when prices increase, the supply of new houses increases.
- For those who aspire to own their own home, the price of housing relative to their income is the key metric. Since expensive homes can drag the average up, the more common metric used is the median (middle) house price. And because most houses are purchased by couples, we compare those prices against the median household income rather than individual incomes.
- For those who own their own home with a sizeable mortgage, they are most likely to be concerned about interest rates which we have not shown here, yet. With more support, we plan to add additional KPIs per issue.
- For those who own their own home freehold, or are close to it, their housing concern, if any, is most likely to be either a) how to buy another property or b) their family, friends, and fellow Kiwis’ ability to achieve home ownership too. As such, the median house price to median household income comparison is likely of most interest to them.
- You can divide the median house price / median household income to achieve a housing affordability ratio. As of May 2023 in New Zealand, this was 6.8x. It hit a high of 8.3x in May 2021. Historically, x3 has been commonly referred to as the benchmark for ‘affordable housing’ (a house costing 3x your household income), but this is a subjective measure up for debate.
Related facts
Wishlist
With support, we’ll be able to add multiple KPIs for each issue:
- Updates on many of the KPIs listed above.
- Housing affordability ratio (just another way of showing the data we have)
- Mortgage interest rates as a % of income (interest vs principal), or median mortgage interest rates
- Rent as a % of income
- Home ownership rates
- New first homeowners per capita
- Median deposit required
- % of mortgage applications approved (if we can get that data from banks)
- Building consents issued (can be misleading if the house is not finished)
Discarded
None
Governments over the timeframe shown
- 1990 = National
1993 = National*
1996 = National/NZ First*
- 1999 = Labour/Alliance + Green
2002 = Labour/Progressive + United
2005 = Labour/Progressive + United, NZ First
- 2008 = National + ACT, United, Māori
2011 = National + ACT, United, Māori
2014 = National + ACT, United, Māori
- 2017 = Labour/NZ First + Green
2020 = Labour + Green
Sources:1,2 (table 5).
© REINZ
Republished with permission
Data published by Stats NZ
© Crown Copyright
Licensed for use under the creative commons attribution licence (BY) 4.0
