Recently I attended an excellent Residential Property Management training workshop hosted by New Zealand’s Real Estate Institute.
As always, I am reminded that we must thirst for knowledge if we are to become a true expert in our chosen field. I came away with an abundance of notes and new learnings, that I am excited to train in and, implement with our Team at Goodwins!
Whilst we eagerly await the summarised results of 2023’s census, we were presented with the following statistics:
- 600,000 households or around 1.4 million people in New Zealand are tenants.
- Approximately 489,000 residential rental properties are owned by private landlords.
- Total value of the residential rental market is at least $15 billion in rental turnover per year, or, 4.3% of GDP in 2021.
These numbers are staggering and highlight the critical role that private landlords play to support New Zealand’s housing needs.
Homeownership is no longer assumed, and international trends suggest that this is unlikely to change.
The amount of time it takes to save a deposit was quoted in February 2023 to be 10.4 years!
To many, this is now also raising serious questions for New Zealand’s long-term planning. NZ Superannuation, for example, was designed with the assumption that most people will own their home and be mortgage-free by the time they retire. That’s increasingly not the case. The number of retirees renting is predicted to double to 600,000 by 2048.
The valuable role of professional property managers partnering with residential landlords committed to delivering quality long-term accommodation is my primary ‘take-away’ as we contemplate these numbers.
And, personally, I feel enormously privileged that we sit at the forefront of actively contributing to the betterment of the rental experience for our tenants, whilst safeguarding and growing our landlord-client’s rental investments.
