It’s the reason I left New Zealand. It has become a very low trust society with a lot of competing political groups aligned on the basis of race, religion, economics, ethnicity, and political beliefs. With so many competing interests, there is very little appetite to propose and enforce broad national policies which benefit everyone. Instead, generations of Kiwis have come to believe (and rightly so) that owning a home is the only way to survive and thrive. They can’t rely on the assistance of the government. Given this, home owners (which comprise the majority of Kiwis), consistently vote for policies to keep their house prices high. This means onerous planning regulations, tax exemptions, and high immigration. Any party which deigns to upset the property speculation ponzi scheme is summarily ousted.
IMHO, the country is now in managed decline. Any serious investment goes straight into property. Entrepreneurial Kiwis leave. I was involved in several startups which had to seek funding from overseas. So they just leave. Usually to the U.S., where their investment culture and infrastructure encourages new ventures and R&D. Home owners have decided that they would rather have their children leave and watch the country burn than allow their house prices to decline. Message received. Something like a million Kiwis live in Australia now. That’s 18% of the entire country.
We love single family homes and local council is full of boomers who hate anything over 2 stories. Plus we’ve had a few instances of construction material shortages.
Idk about other cities but Auckland has started building a ton of midrises and high rises and prices are starting to drop.
Builders build bungalow sprawl, poorly, but get more money for repairs; and rebuilds after fire torches 2-3 of them.
Still not enough houses
Now also not enough land
Low supply vs high demand
Results: Shitty firetrap car-dependent bungalow sprawl at sky-high prices
Don’t talk to me about 7 floors of firetrap lowboy condo shit. 3 mins to get grandpa down the stairs from L7 to L1 after 3c leaves a candle lit is a joke.
Housing always has to go up, or the owner-voters revolt against whoever is in power. So all government policies favour housing appreciation, protect against depreciation, or simply avoid taking meaningful, proportionate and timely action that could cause prices to depreciate.
Even things like airbnb bans, getting rid of exclusionary zoning, etc. are too little, too late. Prices have already been inflated, and owner-occupiers are now holding things up because they can’t simply cash out, write off a loss and move their equity elsewhere because they need somewhere to live. Governments support those owner-occupiers (and often corporate landlords, for as long as they stay in the game) to ensure votes and campaign contributions continue.
We are sitting on a massive, fragile bubble that is getting harder and harder to prop up every year. With insurance issues, climate change, an aging population hoping/needing to cash out equity to fund their retirement, wages way behind inflation for millenials and Gen z, massive amounts of differed municipal infrastructure due to artificially low property tax, unemployment creeping up, etc. there are growing threats to the continued “housing always goes up” economy.
What’s going in with New Zealand and Canada?
It’s the reason I left New Zealand. It has become a very low trust society with a lot of competing political groups aligned on the basis of race, religion, economics, ethnicity, and political beliefs. With so many competing interests, there is very little appetite to propose and enforce broad national policies which benefit everyone. Instead, generations of Kiwis have come to believe (and rightly so) that owning a home is the only way to survive and thrive. They can’t rely on the assistance of the government. Given this, home owners (which comprise the majority of Kiwis), consistently vote for policies to keep their house prices high. This means onerous planning regulations, tax exemptions, and high immigration. Any party which deigns to upset the property speculation ponzi scheme is summarily ousted.
IMHO, the country is now in managed decline. Any serious investment goes straight into property. Entrepreneurial Kiwis leave. I was involved in several startups which had to seek funding from overseas. So they just leave. Usually to the U.S., where their investment culture and infrastructure encourages new ventures and R&D. Home owners have decided that they would rather have their children leave and watch the country burn than allow their house prices to decline. Message received. Something like a million Kiwis live in Australia now. That’s 18% of the entire country.
We love single family homes and local council is full of boomers who hate anything over 2 stories. Plus we’ve had a few instances of construction material shortages.
Idk about other cities but Auckland has started building a ton of midrises and high rises and prices are starting to drop.
Canada:
Results: Shitty firetrap car-dependent bungalow sprawl at sky-high prices
Don’t talk to me about 7 floors of firetrap lowboy condo shit. 3 mins to get grandpa down the stairs from L7 to L1 after 3c leaves a candle lit is a joke.
Also
Housing always has to go up, or the owner-voters revolt against whoever is in power. So all government policies favour housing appreciation, protect against depreciation, or simply avoid taking meaningful, proportionate and timely action that could cause prices to depreciate.
Even things like airbnb bans, getting rid of exclusionary zoning, etc. are too little, too late. Prices have already been inflated, and owner-occupiers are now holding things up because they can’t simply cash out, write off a loss and move their equity elsewhere because they need somewhere to live. Governments support those owner-occupiers (and often corporate landlords, for as long as they stay in the game) to ensure votes and campaign contributions continue.
We are sitting on a massive, fragile bubble that is getting harder and harder to prop up every year. With insurance issues, climate change, an aging population hoping/needing to cash out equity to fund their retirement, wages way behind inflation for millenials and Gen z, massive amounts of differed municipal infrastructure due to artificially low property tax, unemployment creeping up, etc. there are growing threats to the continued “housing always goes up” economy.
Almost all of that applies to NZ.
I thought that list was about NZ, until I got to fire trap…we don’t have that particular problem here.
The rest, well fairly spot on.