Mine is bigger than yours, no mine is bigger than yours!
Often in life, which is perpetuated by social media, we compare ourselves to others. We see things posted online or a friend will brag about something they have accomplished or bought. This is no different when it comes to investments, in fact it can be worse.
Over the past few weeks, we have spoken to many clients around the performance of their Kiwisavers and Investments. After several years of upward growth, we are currently seeing a lot of market volatility. A big part of our role as a Financial Adviser is being a support person, guiding you through the ups and downs.
What we encourage clients to do is, zoom out. Take a wider-angle view, remove yourself from the here and now, what the media is saying, what your friends are saying. Review your plans and goals. Are you still on track for these? Focus on what you want to achieve, rather than how your friend is doing. At the end of the day, what they are doing, should be irrelevant to you achieving your goals and aspirations.
Quality advice is not about beating an index or achieving superior returns. Quality advice is about helping you achieve your goals.
When we go through setting up an investment with you, we put together a personalised plan, based on your goals. We then reflect on your plan each year and adapt the plan when required, as life changes.
In NZ there is a huge gap between what advice is needed and what advice people actually get. We encourage you to get in touch if you would like to discuss the current market and its impact on your investment. Quality financial advice can change the life you lead now and in the future.
From Independent Economist Tony Alexander
Average house prices around New Zealand fell by 1.5% in December and 1.3% in January. They then recovered by 0.5% in February. This tells us two things. First, prices are not unremittingly falling. There is an adjustment underway from unsustainably high levels driven by excessively low interest rates and outrageously high levels of FOMO (fear of missing out) amongst average Kiwis.
The second thing is that the house price boom is over because while the average level of prices in the three months to February was unchanged from the three months to November, the earlier three month rise was 6.6% and before that 3.8% in the three months to August.
The downward pressures on prices are dominant for the moment. They include restricted availability of credit courtesy of tighter LVR and debt to income rules, plus the altered CCCFA. Even after some clarification of new CCCFA rules recently by the Commerce Minister, the availability of credit is less than what it was.
Interest rates have also risen and will go higher by maybe 1.5% – 2% for floating rates and 0.5% – 1.0% for long-term fixed rates, and the temporarily soaring cost of living will make people generally rein in their spending on both very small and very large items.
But the extent to which prices fall will be limited by construction costs which continue to rise, with the latest factors affecting supply being fresh lockdowns to fight Covid-19 in China, and Russia’s war against Ukraine. Higher construction costs will encourage people to switch back to looking through listings of existing property, especially as worries grow about timeliness of completion of some new residential development projects.
The strong jobs market will also keep many people interested in purchasing their first house, upgrading to another, or investing from spare income. Plus, all current mortgage holders had their ability to service debt worked out at interest rates higher than where rates are likely to go in the next two years.
Therefore, it remains appropriate to describe the falls in prices currently underway as a correction from unsustainable heights rather than a crash. Before the end of 2023 some upward trends of mild nature are likely to reassert themselves.
For additional information on the economy, housing market, and interest rates, you can subscribe to Tony’s free weekly Tony’s View publication at www.tonyalexander.nz