New Zealand to allow some wealthy foreign investors onto property market
[September 02, 2025] By
CHARLOTTE GRAHAM-McLAY
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealand will relax a ban on
foreigners buying homes in the country to allow some wealthy overseas
business investors a single high-value residential property purchase,
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said Monday.
The move partially reverses a ban introduced in 2018 by a previous
government to cool a runaway housing market fueled by property
speculation. Holders of a residency “golden visa” reintroduced by
Luxon’s government in April will now be able to buy one home worth at
least 5 million New Zealand dollars ($3 million).
Luxon said the move balanced a desire to attract wealthy investors to
the country with allaying house price fears. The change stops well short
of a full reversal of the policy and would apply only to a small number
of wealthy foreigners and a limited number of houses, he added.
The visas, which were intended to draw overseas investors to the
country's businesses, give residency to people investing a minimum NZ $5
million in New Zealand businesses over three years, or NZ $10 million
over five years if the money is deposited in less risky investments.
Some visa holders had been ineligible to buy property because they
didn’t live in New Zealand for at least six months of the year. That
requirement will now be waived.
Luxon’s opponents decried the policy reversal Monday, saying it focused
on attracting wealthy foreigners instead of solving domestic problems.
“Many Kiwis are already struggling to buy a home, and he has just made
it worse,” opposition Labour housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said.
“Homelessness is up, unemployment is up, and people cannot afford the
basics at the supermarket.”
Push to attract wealthy foreign investors
The government hopes reversing the ban for some will boost economic
growth by luring wealthy foreigners to the country during a period of
recession.
“We’re a safe haven in a very volatile and uncertain world,” Luxon told
reporters in Auckland on Monday, of his government’s pitch to investors
abroad. Those investors would create jobs, he said.
Luxon denied the move would lift house prices which have fallen from a
2022 peak. He said applications so far for the residency visa that would
allow a home purchase could result in up to NZ $1.8 billion in
investment.
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New Zealand's Prime Minister Christopher Luxon arrives at 10 Downing
Street in London, Tuesday, April 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein,
File)
 Officials have received just over
300 applications for the visas, representing about 1,000 people,
government figures showed. Almost 40% of applicants were from the
United States.
Luxon said the rule that houses must be worth a
minimum amount meant that fewer than 1% of New Zealand’s houses -–
about 10,000 homes -– would be eligible for foreign investors to
buy. The majority of those home (about 80%) are in the largest city,
Auckland, with around 10% in the popular skiing and tourism
destination of Queenstown, on the South Island, where wealthy
foreigners have snapped up bolt holes before.
The average cost of a home in July was NZ $767,250, according to
figures from the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand. In Auckland,
the average cost was NZ $975,000.
Housing crisis
The ban on allowing foreigners to buy property, which was introduced
during a housing affordability crisis, prompted debate about the
extent to which foreigners had contributed to ballooning prices and
shut out domestic first-time buyers. Figures at the time showed
about 3% of New Zealand homes were being sold to foreigners,
although the number rose to 22% in Auckland.
Exceptions to the ban were made for Australians and Singaporeans
under trade agreements.
Support for the ban was bolstered by anecdotal tales, never
well-substantiated, of wealthy foreigners building doomsday-style
bunkers in the scenic Queenstown region.
New Zealand, located in a remote part of the South Pacific, is a
popular destination for migrants seeking distance from global tumult
and applications to move there often increase during moments of
turbulence, according to years of official data.
Luxon’s center-right party campaigned in the 2023 election on a
pledge to reverse the ban. His negotiations as part of a coalition
governing deal with other political parties, however, forced him to
compromise on only a partial rollback.
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