Anne Rothschild suggests that restricting foreign ownership is a panacea for rocketing house prices, and cites New Zealand as an example of a country that’s implemented such a policy (Letters, 23 March).
What she omits to say is that in New Zealand it seems to have failed, pretty spectacularly. In the past two years, property prices in New Zealand have gone absolutely bananas, even though non-resident foreigners are now mostly locked out of the market. Housing in Auckland is now less affordable than in New York and London, according to this year’s Demographia report.
Restricting foreign ownership hasn’t stopped house prices in New Zealand going nuts, but it has fed xenophobic narratives about foreigners being the cause of societal ills. Having said that, checks and balances must be in place to prevent dirty money being laundered via the housing market – and that’s where the UK (and London in particular) needs to get its house in order.
Richard Crampton
Auckland, New Zealand
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