The housing market monster continues to grow, causing panic and rapture, depending on who you are. Michael Andrew highlights some of the most vexing stats. It was supposed to be a quiet summer – the lazy, festive period that would typically see the masses forgoing open homes for the open road, and property investors taking … Read more
For two decades, under both National and Labour governments, housing costs have risen far faster than wages. Here’s a horrific graph that shows by just how much. Last Thursday saw the first of what will no doubt be dozens of housing-related set pieces from Labour, wherein they announced 8,000 public and transitional houses. Or, as … Read more
Good morning and welcome to the first regular season Bulletin of 2021. In today’s edition: High alert as woman in Northland tests Covid-positive, house price inflation races ahead unabated, and schools grappling with new year after last year’s disruptions. Ministers and health officials were keeping their options open yesterday afternoon after a new case in … Read more
As house prices escalate rapidly around the country, Kawerau saw them more than double, the biggest nationwide increase over the decade. Alex Braae goes to the Bay of Plenty town to find out what impact it is having on renters. The headline figure was stark. Data from realestate.co.nz showed that over the last decade, Kawerau’s … Read more
Good morning and welcome to this one-off edition of The Bulletin, covering major stories from the last few weeks. A quick preamble to this: Today’s special edition of The Bulletin is all about filling you in on some of the stories you might have missed over the summer period. Perhaps you had the radio on in … Read more
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he’s joined by economist Tony Alexander. As chief economist at the BNZ for 25 years, Tony Alexander held one of the … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Trevor Mallard under pressure over legal costs, questions over why border testing review is still under wraps, and Massey academics speak out against cuts. Speaker Trevor Mallard is under pressure over the costs of paying out to end a defamation dispute. In the wake of the … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: First poll after election shows Labour surging, Treasury officials sounded alarm about uncapped film rebates, and full scale of Napier flood damage becoming clear Labour has taken a significant winners bonus in the first poll run after the election. The One News Colmar Brunton survey had them on … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Shocking incidents show prison culture, exchange of letters over monetary policy more exciting than it sounds, and Auckland locations close over Covid warning. A shocking story from Auckland Women’s Prison that raises questions about whether prisoners are being treated humanely. Radio NZ’s Guyon Espiner reports that … Read more
Thanks to falling interest rates and higher wages, mortgage affordability has remained surprisingly steady, writes Greg Ninness for interest.co.nz. But that doesn’t mean things aren’t a lot tougher for those trying to get onto the housing ladder. The latest house price figures make startling reading for potential first home buyers. According to the Real Estate … Read more
Good morning and welcome the The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Contrasting visions on National’s defeat and future, St Johns ambulance in deep funding hole, and Tauranga mayor quits with call to sack council. Contrasting visions for why National lost the election so badly have been presented at the party’s AGM. As the NZ Herald’s (paywalled) Derek Cheng reports, … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Stories of the modern housing crisis, commerce commission to study supermarket industry, and Tauranga’s local government civil war deepens. The term ‘housing crisis’ featured a lot in NZ politics over the last decade, but it means different things to different people. In today’s Bulletin, I’m going … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Questions over how Greens should approach Labour relationship, Auckland pub patrons told to self-isolate, and highly leveraged investors send house prices higher. How lucky is the Green party, to have so many people giving advice and suggestions right now? As talks continue around the formation of … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: NZ government adds voice in global encryption fight, a whole bunch of election stuff happens, and more than half the country believes house prices must fall. Should governments be able to access the encrypted data held by technology companies? That is being debated after New Zealand … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Horticulture industry facing labour crisis, details of new cases spark concern, and Canterbury candidate under fire for local government record. Fears are growing that fruit will simply rot on the vine this season, because nobody will be there to pick it. Plenty of this sort of … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Reckoning comes for wage subsidy, house prices no longer tipped to fall, and second death in the same family from Covid-19. It was a policy conceived in an emergency, was deployed rapidly, and prevented a total economic disaster from crashing over the country. But now serious … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: New sexuality and relationship education guidelines announced, things happen and announcements made on campaign trail, and reason for massive health funding shortfall in South Auckland revealed. New guidelines for sexuality and relationships education in schools have been released, with the aim of making them more … Read more
While banks predict house prices will still fall, by how much depends on a number of factors – including location, reports Brent Melville for BusinessDesk. Banks are being less than apocalyptic on their expectations for a post-Covid housing market correction, which could be as low as 5%, although they warn of potentially significant regional variations. … Read more
In ditching the CGT, Jacinda Ardern has implicitly accepted that the primary structure of savings and investment in New Zealand will remain bound up in the family home. Accepting this reality may have been necessary to keep Kiwibuild on life support as house prices begin to fall. Avoiding solutions to the political question of wealth … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Latest QV figures show huge house price rises in smaller towns, new study shows terrible bottom trawling impact, and nurses give natural disaster warning. Concerns are being raised about small town house prices, with the view that they too are steadily becoming unaffordable. It comes off the … Read more
Simon Bridges said the Government Tax Working Group’s call for a capital gains tax was an ‘assault on the Kiwi way of life’. That betrays a very depressing and limited view of the Kiwi way of life, says Hayden Donnell. The ink had barely dried on the Tax Working Group report and Simon Bridges was … Read more
New environmental taxes get the thumbs up, but commentators are as divided as ever on the thorny issue of a capital gains tax. The report is out, and as expected the government’s Tax Working Group (TWG) has recommended introducing a broad-based capital gains tax (CGT). While the social justice community applauds the move, business groups … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Parliament hears dire data on ocean plastics, Provincial Growth Fund to spend millions for 3 jobs, and minister Clare Curran on personal leave. The spread of microplastics in New Zealand’s coastal waters is increasing, to the point where 80% of samples taken in a study were … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Two day justice summit wraps up, Winston Peters gets up to mischief in Australia, and voting in the Howick by-election gets underway. A two day summit on justice, crime and rehabilitation has concluded in Porirua. Senior ministers heard a range of views about what was wrong with … Read more
The government says new data suggesting foreign buyers have a much larger role in the housing market than previously thought is “a vindication” of its foreign buyer ban. But that doesn’t mean the ban makes any sense, writes Guyon Espiner for RNZ. It’s a great bumper sticker. Ban foreign buyers! It’s simple, it resonates and … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: ASB data paints very different foreign buyer picture, fuel tax passes into law, and a battle is brewing on the West Coast over grazing rights on heritage land. ASB has come out with significantly higher rates of houses being bought by foreign owners, in a recently released … Read more
Throw the man a dolphin and buy his $1.9m Point Chevalier house. When we think of ‘public service journalism’ we usually think of holding the government to account and filing lots of OIAs. But public service comes in many forms, and one of the greatest public service television programmes of the 21st century is the … Read more
Auckland Council has released the city’s new property valuations and some people who should know better have taken the chance to say all sorts of stupid things. Simon Wilson sets them straight. Jo Holmes from the Auckland Ratepayers’ Alliance was on RNZ’s Morning Report today saying that Aucklanders will be paying “thousands of dollars” more … Read more