Local schools play a big part in property-buying decisions for many New Zealanders. Photo / Dean Purcell
The Herald has analysed property prices for 337 Auckland school zones to discover where house prices are highest and lowest and where they’ve changed the most. Check the table below to see the
In the zone
Most expensive: Victoria Avenue Primary zone
Biggest gainer: Bayfield School zone
Biggest high school gainer: Macleans College zone
Friday, 26 April 2024, 12:14
After a slight drop in the third quarter of last year, the price of housing has risen once again in Malaga province, the latest data shows.
In the first three months of this year, the average price per square metre of a property for sale in the province including the Costa del Sol climbed to 2,412 euros, according to valuation firm Gesvalt. It is 1.2% more than the figure recorded at the end of 2023 and about the same figure as a year ago, when the valuer’s studies showed an average price of 2,419 euros per square metre. The data shows that the 4% drop in the prices of property for sale in Malaga province in the third quarter of last year was a one-off event.
Additionally, rental prices continue to soar in both Malaga city and throughout the province. According to Gesvalt data, the average rental price at provincial level is 14.32 euros per square metre, which is 13.5% more than a year ago and 3.2% more than three months ago.
However, the increase in rent is most noticeable in Malaga city, where the average cost has risen to 14.41 euros per square metre, 16% more than a year ago, according to the data.
In the city, the average price of housing for sale stands at 2,374 euros per square metre, which is 8% more than in the first quarter of 2023 and 2.5% more than in last year’s year-end report.
Upward trend to continue
According to Gregorio Abril, Gesvalt’s regional director for Andalucía and Extremadura, house prices in Malaga are set to continue “the upward trend of recent months, but at a more moderate pace than in recent years, tending towards stabilisation, after the slight slump in demand caused by successive interest rate increases and a general economic slowdown”.
“Once this phase has been overcome, and with the prospect of upcoming interest rate cuts, demand has once again been reactivated in a market that remains under pressure, pushing prices up again,” Abril said.
Malaga is one of the most active real estate markets in Spain, “the demand, both national and international is very active, compared to a supply that, despite the efforts of the city council and the great developer activity, is still insufficient to meet it”, the real estate expert added.
“All these factors lead us to believe that there will not be a change in trend in the coming months and it is not possible to foresee when price rises will slow,” he said.
As for the unstoppable rise in rent, Abril pointed out that this is a “more common issue than that of buying and selling”.
“While supply is more limited than for sales, there is a transfer of demand from the sales to the rental market, due to the number of house-hunters who are unable to afford to buy a home at current prices and decide to opt for renting. Our forecast is that the current trend will continue over the next few years,” he added.
Costa rentals
On the Costa del Sol, Marbella continues to lead in rental prices with an average of 18.8 euros per square metre, 12% more than a year ago. Also noteworthy is the rise in rent in towns such as Torremolinos and Benalmádena, possibly due to the increase of prices in Malaga city leading to a rise in demand for rentals in these neighbouring towns.
In the case of Torremolinos, rent has risen to 14.6 euros per square metre and is now at the same level as Estepona, with a year-on-year increase of 12%, the data shows.
At the other end of the scale Vélez-Málaga offers rents at half of the average registered on the Costa del Sol, with prices around 7.5 euros per square metre.
- There are some 670,000 homes in Britain with a price tag of at least £1million
- Savills data found number of property millionaires fell by 8.3 per cent in a year
Some of Britain’s newly-minted property millionaires have lost their £1million home-owning status, according to a leading estate agent.
The number of £1million-plus homes in Britain peaked during the pandemic property boom, but has now slipped back after the race for space fizzled out and higher mortgage rates hit the market.
Savills said that at the end of 2023 there were an estimated 670,000 homes across Britain with a price tag of at least £1million, down 60,260 – or 8.3 per cent – on the year before.
However, this is still up 28 per cent – at an increase of 146,490 – compared to 2019, with most of the movement concentrated beyond the capital.
Britain’s £1million home market now stands at £1.32trillion, down from £1.43trillion in 2022, the estate agent said.
Lucian Cook, of Savills, explained: ‘The race for space and dash to the countryside from mid-2020 drove a sharp increase in the number of £1million homes outside of London and other urban settings.
‘However, increased mortgage costs and a rebalancing of demand back to city living have meant about 30 per cent of the those whose homes crossed the £1million threshold, have, for the time being at least, become aspiring million pound homeowners once again.’
London saw the smallest decrease in property millionaires last year – with a drop of 4 per cent, followed by Scotland, which was down 5 per cent.
Areas outside of London saw the most significant drop in property millionaires. But the number of £1million homes outside of London still remains 52 per cent higher than 2019.
Wales has seen an increase of 113 per cent, while the North East – where numbers are up 79 per cent -and the East Midlands – up 79 per cent – have seen the most significant uplift in housing stock valued at £1million or more over that period.
It follows separate analysis of £1million-plus sales by TwentyCI last year, which revealed that London locations continue to dominate the £1million map.
The boroughs of Kensington & Chelsea, Westminster, Camden, Hammersmith & Fulham and Richmond-Upon-Thames had the highest percentage of sales that were above £1million in 2023.
Indeed, London locations made up eight of the top 10 local authorities, joined by Elmbridge and Mole Valley outside of London.
Mr Cook added: ‘New one million-pound hotspots popped up across the breadth of Britain in the wake of the pandemic, as affluent home buyers changed priorities in the search for more space.
‘However in 2023, prime property prices held up stronger in the capital than across the rest of the country – down 1.1 per cent verses down 4.8 per cent – meaning London boroughs have been more easily been able to hold on to their share of £1million property sales.’
A square in the heart of Londonwas recently named as Britain’s most expensive place to live.
Mayfair’s Grosvenor Square led the Halifax annual survey of the most expensive streets in Britain, with an average price tag of £20.35million.
Heading west to the borough of Kensington and Chelsea in fashionable Notting Hill, Clarendon Road took second spot with an average price tag just shy of the £20million mark, at £19.96million.
Making up the top three – and home to world-famous luxury shopping destination Harrods – was London’s Knightsbridge, where properties cost an average £19.95million.
If a home on one of London’ priciest streets is top of the Christmas list this year, deep pockets will be needed, with the average price tag now £14.5million.
Bert Potter (front) and residents of the Centrepoint Community in Albany. Photo / Supplied
A multimillion-dollar Auckland property that was the site of New Zealand’s most infamous commune, Centrepoint, has been withdrawn from sale without finding a buyer.
The huge site in the city’s north has a council valuation of almost $9 million and had been billed as “one of the last significant underdeveloped landholdings on the fringe of Albany”.
It also has a dark history as it was where Bert Potter served as the spiritual head of the Centrepoint commune.
Potter was arrested in 1990 for sexual abuse and drugs crime, with survivors sharing stories of life in the commune in the acclaimed documentary, Heaven and Hell – The Centrepoint Story, in 2021. Many of them had been exploited as children by adults living at the commune.
The commune was shut in 2000 and Potter died in 2012, aged 86.
Since then, the property at 14 Mills Lane has been run as a wellness and retreat centre, before being put up for sale and marketed last year as a big development opportunity.
However, agent Michael Nees, from Bayleys North Shore Commercial, said the property did not get a buyer “so it was withdrawn from the market” at the seller’s wish.
Advertisements for the sale of the site were taken down from property website OneRoof in December.
Council has valued the 7.62ha site at $8.7m, but it is believed the owners had hoped to get more than $10m.
Owners Prema Charitable Trust bought the property in 2008 for just over $4m. The trust operates the Kawai Purapura retreat at the site, which was also home to the Wellpark College of Natural Therapies.
It had been advertised as “an incomparable opportunity” to secure a huge slice of city land where applying for rezoning could generate “considerable value uplift”.
The site sits on land overlooking Albany’s commercial precinct and is close to Albany Bus Station and Westfield shopping centre.
Centrepoint was opened by Potter in 1977 and at its peak had a permit for 244 fulltime residents.
It was based on therapeutic encounter groups popularised in California in the 1960s, promising social transformation by encouraging open communication.
The commune was shut down in 2000 after some leaders, including Potter, were convicted of sexual abuse and drugs crimes.
Potter was convicted and sentenced in 1990 to three and a half years in jail on drug charges and in 1992 to seven and a half years for indecent assaults on five children, some as young as 3.
Other men were also convicted of indecently assaulting minors, sexually assaulting minors and attempted rape of a minor.
A 2010 Massey University study revealed that one in every three children at Centrepoint was sexually abused.
Three survivors from the infamous cult spoke out in 2021, writing an open letter calling for restorative justice for children who were abused.
Christchurch GP Caroline Ansley wrote the letter with two other Centrepoint survivors, who are featured in the TVNZ docudrama Heaven and Hell – The Centrepoint Story.
Ansley said realising she was not the only one who was abused was empowering.
“I had to ask myself what’s worse – fear of exposure or the disappointment of not advocating for the right thing.”
The trio asked in their letter that former Centrepoint members consider “their obligations towards the children of the community” and acknowledge the resulting social, emotional and psychological difficulties many still experience as adults.
“We ask you to hear our voices. We ask you to set aside your complex feelings surrounding this issue and acknowledge our realities. We ask that you work with us to find ways to enable healing and restoration of the history.”
Drugs such as LSD and ecstasy were manufactured on the property and taken in group experiments that involved youngsters.
“This potent mix of social control, parental child neglect, drug use and hyper-sexuality set the scene for child abuse to occur,” the letter stated.
The signatories, some of them anonymous but known to the authors, include Louise Winn. She was only 11 when she was brought to Potter’s hut by his wife Margie. She was later also sexually abused by his son John Potter and other men.
To keep predators away at night, the girl barricaded herself with junk in her caravan on the property or escaped into the bush.