Who should have a home?
Yesterday, the Herald published this story
The headline wasn’t true.
Today, the headline is different, It’s not 3% – ASB analysis suggests up to a fifth of properties sold to non-citizens.
There’s a big difference.
It’s hard to get statistics on how many citizens there are in NZ vs other long-term residents. The Census, for example, doesn’t ask — as Stats NZ explains here, that’s partly because it’s more complicated than you think, and partly because there’s no good reason to care. Citizen vs resident is rarely an important distinction. A non-citizen with a residence-class visa can’t run for Parliament, but they can vote, serve in the defence forces, play for the All Blacks, and, yes, buy a home.
Up to a fifth of home purchases does seem a lot, but in this case “up to a fifth” actually means:
the assumption was that the true figure was at the lower end of the 11 per cent to 21 per cent range “but there’s no way to know. …”
It’s not just the headline: the story is a bit misleading.
First, they’re leaving out an important mechanism whereby real estate is transferred from non-citizens to citizens. My house is currently owned by a non-citizen. Some time early next year (if I get around to requesting my US police report soon), I hope it will be owned by a New Zealand citizen. And my citizenship change wouldn’t show up in the ASB analysis.
Second, the ASB range of 11-21% is for homes, not properties as the headline claimed. Both ASB and StatsNZ make this distinction carefully.
Third, the extent to which the ASB analysis and StatsNZ numbers differ has been exaggerated a bit. Here’s the StatsNZ report, which ASB links to. The StatsNZ numbers for home transfers:
- 79 percent involved at least one NZ citizen
- 9.9 percent involved only corporate entities
- 8.0 percent involved at least one NZ-resident-visa holder (but no citizens)
- 3.3 percent involved no NZ citizens or resident-visa holders (up from 2.9 percent in the December 2017 quarter).
If you add 8 and 3 you get 11. If you add 8 and 3 and 9.9 you get 21.
If you don’t separate residents from citizens the range is 3-13%.
And if you go along with the ASB report’s assumption that the true figure is at the lower end of the range, well, you’d get a much more boring headline.
Thomas Lumley (@tslumley) is Professor of Biostatistics at the University of Auckland. His research interests include semiparametric models, survey sampling, statistical computing, foundations of statistics, and whatever methodological problems his medical collaborators come up with. He also blogs at Biased and Inefficient See all posts by Thomas Lumley »
Indeed. Two “non-citizens” bought this house in 2014. One is now a citizen and the other is waiting for his ceremony date. But it was sold to non-citizens.
However, having moved here from Vancouver in 2012 I see Auckland making many of the same mistakes we made in the 1990s. And now the sorts of people who would work in key service won’t ever be able to own a home. Many now can’t afford to rent unless they double up per bedroom. The social fabric of the place is fraying…which isn’t good for anyone.
6 years ago
It’s hard to get statistics on how many citizens there are in NZ vs other long-term residents. The Census, for example, doesn’t ask — as Stats NZ explains here, that’s partly because it’s more complicated than you think, and partly because there’s no good reason to care. Citizen vs resident is rarely an important distinction. A non-citizen with a residence-class visa can’t run for Parliament, but they can vote, serve in the defence forces, play for the All Blacks, and, yes, buy a home.
………..
It may not matter to you. You are a professor (the world is your oyster).
More than 94 per cent of Chinese permanent residents and more than half of those with NZ citizenship told University of Auckland researchers that they felt a greater sense of belonging and identified more with their country of origin than New Zealand.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/multiculturalism/news/article.cfm?c_id=58&objectid=10783815
6 years ago
To be precise, I was referring to StatsNZ’s view that there wasn’t a legitimate Census purpose to distinguishing.
Also, I’ve been trying to take people at their word that the concern over overseas investors is actually about overseas investors and not a cover for anti-immigration sentiment.
6 years ago
I think if you asked adult NZers living in Oz whether they “felt a greater sense of belonging and identified more with their country of origin than” Australia that you’d get the same kind of response.
I don’t think it’s a helpful question.
6 years ago