1 August 2016

New property data consistent with last quarter

New figures on property transfers and tax residency show similar levels of foreign tax resident property buyers as the previous quarter, says Land Information New Zealand (LINZ).

LINZ Deputy Chief Executive Russell Turner says that while the data is not a register of foreign ownership, it can add to the picture of what’s happening with property in New Zealand.

Overall transfers

“In this quarter we saw the number of all transfers in New Zealand increase by more than 12000, but with a similar split of foreign and New Zealand tax residents. This includes trusts and businesses as well as individuals.”

Between 1 April and 30 June 2016, 3 percent of those transfers involved buyers who indicated an overseas tax residency – the same percent as in the previous quarter. Similarly, 3 percent of transfers involved sellers with overseas tax residency – this compares to 2 percent in the previous quarter. Of the remaining transfers over this time:

• 60 percent of transfers involved buyers who have only New Zealand tax residency. This compares to 50 percent in the previous quarter.

• 37 percent involved buyers who did not need to provide tax information – the majority of these were New Zealand citizens or residents who were buying their main home. This is the same percentage as the previous quarter.

Previous quarters included a large percentage of transfers where information was not required because their sale and purchase agreement was signed before the law came into force. This has now dropped to less than 1 percent in April-June 2016.

Transfers involving a home on the land

Mr Turner says to help find out more about property transfers in New Zealand, buyers and sellers are also asked to provide information about their citizenship or visa status.

“This indicates that for properties where there’s a home on the land, 1695 transfers (3 percent) didn’t involve buyers who were New Zealand citizens or residents, 41694 (82 percent) indicated that they were citizens or residents, and 7521 (15 percent) involved trust companies or businesses.”

LINZ releases this data each quarter, with the next release planned for November 2016.

Read the report on property transfer and tax residency statistics on the LINZ website:http://www.linz.govt.nz/news/2016-08/new-property-data-consistent-last-quarter

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Notes for editors

Key figures 2016

LINZ also gathered figures for the 1 Oct-31 Dec Quarter. However, this is not as useful for direct comparison as, over this time, a high number of buyers and sellers did not need to provide information about tax residency because their contract was signed before the legislation came into force.

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