Jamie Mackay from The Country had his monthly catch-up with Peter Newbold, General Manager of PGG Wrightson Real Estate.

Jamie Mackay from The Country recently caught up with Peter Newbold, GM of PGG Wrightson Real Estate for their monthly check on the pulse of the rural real estate market.  First on the agenda, forestry conversions of sheep and beef properties.  Is the market slowing down?  Peter confirmed activity has slowed and is becoming a more local phenomenon with a bit of pressure on values.  In the long term this is probably a good thing.  

Turning to dairy, Peter pointed out the market has been fairly static, affected by high running costs and interest rates.  

Horticulture has been the star for the last few years but kiwifruit has had a very challenging two or three seasons.  Peter reckons kiwifruit has had a good run and it's time for a period of readjustment.  But consensus seems to be they'll come back again.  Horticulture in the Hawke's Bay region has been slow but there's been quite a lot of activity among sheep and beef properties.

Jamie raised anecdotal evidence he'd heard about a lot of farmers exiting the industry and retiring.  The question has to be who will buy these farms.

Peter agreed that there'll be significant change in farm ownership over the next few years.  There will be a market as rural areas remain a great place to live and work.  A lot of good properties that have been held in the same family for generations will come to market.  At the moment there's not a lot of corporate activity in that space.  Mainly neighbours and regional buyers, or a few buyers outside the traditional rural space investing in farms.  

Peter confirmed there's still good interest in lifestyle properties with values at a point where people are comfortable.  The change of working habits post COVID and the improved facilities available in regional and provincial New Zealand are all factors.  More and more people will be choosing the lifestyle property option.

Property report: Forestry and carbon farming

Jamie Mackay from The Country recently had his monthly real estate update from PGG Wrightson.

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