If a recent valuation of your home has come in lower than expected, it’s worth understanding why. Many owners are still measuring their equity against the market’s peak in late 2021, a neighbour’s boom-era sale, or an optimistic asking price. A registered valuation measures something different: the price the property would achieve today, based on recent settled comparable sales.
In Hawke’s Bay’s current market, that number has been broadly flat to softening, a reflection of where the market actually sits.
A genuinely flat market, not a one-off
QV’s House Price Index for the July 2026 quarter, released 10 August 2026, shows the national average home value fell 1.5% over the three months to the end of July, to $898,799, down 1.2% on a year earlier. Napier’s average home value eased 0.4% over the quarter to $750,085, while Hastings fell 2.3% to $758,265. Central Hawke’s Bay was the only district in the region to record a net gain over the July quarter, up 0.8%; Wairoa and Central Hawke’s Bay have both recorded the largest declines so far this calendar year. QV attributes the softness to affordability constraints, cautious bank lending, persistent inflation, global economic uncertainty and sentiment ahead of November’s election.
REINZ’s figures tell a similar story. The national median sale price sat at $770,000 in June 2026, essentially flat on a year earlier (+0.7%), while the national House Price Index, REINZ’s more methodologically robust, mix-adjusted measure, was down 0.8% annually. Days to sell nationally sat at 48. Hawke’s Bay has recorded annual price declines through 2026, consistent with the wider provincial pattern: markets that saw outsized gains in the 2020–21 boom have seen correspondingly larger corrections, and the region remains a thin, buyer-favourable market with elevated listing stock.
Interest rates: falling, then not
The Reserve Bank cut the Official Cash Rate by 325 basis points from its 5.5% peak in August 2024 to 2.25% by late November 2025, and many owners have assumed that trajectory would simply continue. It hasn’t. An inflation shock linked to the Middle East conflict and higher oil prices pushed the RBNZ to raise the OCR to 2.5% in July 2026, with the Bank signalling further increases are now more likely than cuts before year end. For anyone hoping easier rates would restore borrowing power, that assumption needs revisiting, bank serviceability testing is not loosening in the way the 2024–25 easing cycle suggested it would.
Why a flat valuation caps what you can borrow
Two Reserve Bank settings turn a flat valuation into a hard borrowing ceiling. Debt-to-income (DTI) restrictions, in force since 1 July 2024, limit standard bank lending to six times gross annual income for owner-occupiers and seven times for investors, with only 20% of each bank’s new lending permitted above that threshold. Loan-to-value ratio (LVR) settings were eased on 1 December 2025, banks can now lend up to 25% of new owner-occupier business (up from 20%) and 10% of investor business to borrowers with deposits under 20%, but that eases the deposit side of the equation, not the income side. In practice, DTI is now often the binding constraint: even a property that is genuinely rich in paper equity cannot unlock lending beyond what the owner’s income supports. When a valuation sits flat, it is usually this income ceiling, not the valuation itself, that is limiting how much equity a business owner can actually draw down.
The professional point
A registered valuation is a point-in-time assessment of market value, supported by comparable evidence, current as at the date of inspection. Understanding what it reflects, recent settled sales rather than a remembered high-water mark or an asking price, helps owners plan with an accurate picture of their borrowing position in a market that is still finding its feet.
Paul Harvey is the Director of Williams’ Harvey Registered Valuers. He has a diverse and broad knowledge of the HB property market.
paulharvey@williamsharvey.co.nz www.williamsharvey.co.nz
