Is this due to kiwi culture which dreamed for standalone houses?! Whenever I asked question about townhouses in different forums there is a guard against them! Intense disagreement.

What is bad with very new brand new townhouse with low insurance and rate and no maintenance and reasonably priced in very good location near train bus hospital shopping centers etc say in wellington if I buy and rent covers my mortgage and I top up a bit monthly for costs?! I want to cover my risk of not buying house and regret later and my first goal is cashflow whatever it is!

Been looking at a few older places and they all seem to have their own issues. Some people say moisture is the big one, others say old wiring is worse. What’s your biggest red flag and why?

Kia ora, first‑time poster here.

I’ve got a 1960s weatherboard 3‑bedroom home that’s now too big for just myself and my 6‑year‑old. Family situation changed. It’s solid but pretty outdated, original kitchen cabinetry, bathroom needs a tidy‑up, and the carpet is due for replacement.

My plan is to rent this place out and buy something smaller, more modern, and low‑maintenance.

The dilemma:

Do I spend $20–30k now (that would take all my savings and some) on a basic kitchen refresh, new carpet, and a bathroom spruce‑up before renting it out?

Or do I rent it out as‑is, move into something smaller, and tackle the renos later when my finances are more stable?

Or are there other options i should consider?

More context: my current mortgage repayments are just under $400pw. Based on other similar type rentals in this area, I could rent this property out at $580 - $620pw.

If anyone has experienced a similar situation, I’d really appreciate your thoughts. Be gentle with me x

What’s the issue? Is there any obvious warning signs to spot? What does remediation look like?

Thanks team

Do you buy two bedrooms townhouse around floor 70m2 and all 81m2 in very good location which is rentable and very brand new for investment purpose or 1960s standalone with around 300 m2 overall three bedrooms but not in very good location? Goal is cashflow first. I know initially I might need to top up

Does anybody know whether insurance covered in body corp fee for new townhouses? I mean is this same insurance that buyers of other houses pay and included in body corp?

More a rant/FYI to those looking for realtors in Wellington, we are arranging viewings for a number of properties and 4 of the 6 we messaged were prompt and good to deal with, but two were no reply.

Don’t wanna name and shame, but ya not great.

I'm interested to know what hidden costs have caught you off guard when buying a home here in New Zealand?

I recently spoke with Frances Cook of Making Cents and we talked through the true cost of buying a home in New Zealand, and some of the expenses that can derail your plans if you’re not prepared.

Things like: legal fees, building inspections, meth or asbestos testing, unexpected repair issues in older homes, the extra cash you need on hand before going unconditional. Or in my case, needing to replace the 105-year-old water cylinder... and then having to replace the pipes because they weren't compatible with the new cylinder!

I want to hear from those of you who’ve been through the process. What hidden costs surprised you when buying a home and what tips would you give others to help them prepare for the financial commitment that is home ownership?

We went to a openhome over the weekend. The agent was very helpful and nice. I expressed my interest & gave my details and he mentioned they would call me to discuss as the deadline was on the 5/05/2026. He didn’t call, I had some emergency so I couldn’t call them too.

I checked the property again on 06/05 on their website the deadline was moved to 07/05. So I clicked on contact number on the listing. The other agent picked up and talked about how they were looking for my details and his colleague lost them. I gave him on my email on the call again requesting him to send me more information & available paperwork on the property so I can do my real and decide if I want to put an offer on the house. In addition to that I texted him my email address.

Yet nothing no paperwork, no response - anyone dealt with similar situation. Or this something that agents do because they don’t like certain buyers ? This is not the first time it happened to me.

Update: I looked up to contact their office manager turns out the agent icing me out is the CEO of the Brokerage lol.😂 funtimes

Situation is, we paid of the house we were living in, then bought a much more expensive house which we have now moved into, so we will rent out the old house. The issue is we now have $650k remaining on our private house, and our investment property is freehold.... so we can't claim an costs on interest.

We have been advised that we could set up a LTC, sell the investment to the LTC, then we can pay off our private home, and the investment property will hold the debt, and in turn can then claim interest deductability. We are just wondering if its all the rigmaril of setting up an LTC? Or should we just continue to hack away out our current private loan.

We own a large West Auckland property and are currently weighing up sell vs keep options.

It’s a fairly unique property that would likely suit investors or extended-family buyers more than standard owner-occupiers. In this market, it’s hard to know whether the right buyer is out there or not.

We don’t have to sell, but it’s family-owned and some family members are getting on, so we’d like to properly assess the options.

The property has three income-producing dwellings on one site, is fully tenanted, and returning roughly 6% yield. Hard to know exact value in this market, but likely somewhere in the low $2m range.

We’re considering selling privately / off-market rather than listing publicly.

Main reasons:

• avoid tyre kickers
• avoid paying $40k–$70k commission
• minimise disruption for tenants
• test genuine buyer interest first

It feels like the right buyer may come through investor networks rather than public listing sites.

Rough plan:

• Put together a professional PDF info pack
• Use quality staged photos from when it was previously presented for Airbnb (clearly labelled pre-tenancy)
• Include rents, land size, layout, strengths, yield etc
• Quietly circulate it to relevant buyers / networks

I’m also considering approaching a few reputable local agents and saying:

>

That feels like a possible easy ~$20k for the right agent, but maybe I’m naïve.

Then run it as a quiet deadline process:

>

Questions for anyone who has sold privately/off-market or bought this way:

1. Is offering selected agents a 1% intro fee smart, or just headache material?
2. Best places to reach serious buyers/investors privately in NZ?
3. How do you create enough competition without going public?
4. Any traps selling a tenanted property this way?
5. At what point would you stop trying privately and go full public listing?

Interested in any views, especially real NZ experience. Happy for private messages from anyone who has done similar.

Consider you buy a house with 600k price and pay 120k deposit. Internet rate fixed 5 percent fot 5 years consider capital growth of 5 percent yearly for house price.. ignore rate insurance and related costs. How much is your loss profit if you sell house after 5 years?!

I just checked chatgpt as we have principal and interest separately and I want to compare hrrrr to see whether it is correct

I know 5 years is not enough time I know 5 percent cannot be logical assumption of capital growth these days and much worse rate insurance etc but seems to me house is not an investment thing that much anymore!!

If a neighbours balcony needs work done am I on the hook for it?

Hi there, First home buyer here. Our conditional offer has been accepted and tomorrow is the last day for below conditions, LIM, Buildings report & Solicitors Approval.

Finance condition still has 5 more working days.

We found several issues in building report and initiated renegotiation process. Haven’t heard back from the vendors yet. I am pretty nervous, my lawyer asked for an update and their solicitor responded saying they are still waiting on response from the vendors.

Since we are waiting on their response at this point - I wanna make we are not at breach what are the things I should be doing?

The bank also came back with conditional approval pending property valuation. I am confused if I need to spend anymore money on this property. Please advise

If you can save up to 7.5k monthly and have 100k cash and want to buy a house in wellington area do you buy now or wait for larger deposit?

Currently working through a small property project (in Auckland) and thought I’d share a bit of the process and see what people think.

Beginning to build 13 Town houses starting from $559 (2 bedroom) and going up to mid 600's (3beddy).

It’s been interesting seeing how the numbers actually play out vs what you read online. Between interest rates, build costs, and timelines, there’s not a lot of margin for error right now. Definitely not the “easy money” people used to talk about.

I’m curious how others are approaching deals in the current market:

• Are you still buying?
• Sitting on the sidelines?
• Only going for high-margin/value-add stuff?

Also interested in what buyers are actually looking for at the moment. Has been hard to do pre sales at the moment, and just thought there would be more interest.