In charts: being COVID-free isn’t everything

However the closed border has made importing skilled staff all but impossible so one has to be wary of interpreting that finding as supporting strong labour demand.

" Lockdown impacts mean catch-up sales occurred in a typically quieter time of year, making for some spectacular year-on-year sales growth percentages, but the overshoot’s actually pretty mild.”But there is real resilience. More traditional slowdown problems, like tough competition and low turnover, have gained ground, although not that much. And cash flow and access to finance barely register.

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Being COVID-free isn’t everything

The regional breakdown of the ANZ consumer confidence survey shows households on the tourist trail – the South Island – are considerably more worried than Aucklanders. Indeed, they took the August lockdown harder than Auckland, the epicentre. Wellington, New Zealand’s “Government Town”, is the most upbeat.

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Supply and demand

There’s no question the New Zealand housing market is ‘hot’. But how much is raging demand and how much is crimped supply? Lockdown impacts mean catch-up sales occurred in a typically quieter time of year, making for some spectacular year-on-year sales growth percentages, but the overshoot’s actually pretty mild.

And also, new listings have been very subdued. If listings belatedly overshoot just as the house sale catch-up runs out of puff, the heat could dissipate quite quickly.

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Sharon Zollner is New Zealand Chief Economist at ANZ