When Colliers Otago releases their latest Otago Property Market Review and Outlook next month, it will mark 30 years of producing data and analysis about property in the region.
Annually, the team delivers expert insights and projections across the residential, commercial, and lifestyle sectors of the market and these reports have now been digitised into searchable PDFs by the Lakes District Museum & Gallery, meaning they are freely available to anyone to access as a resource.
The Otago Property Market Review and Outlook has a strong history in the local market and was started by Barry Robertson of Robertson Valuations in the early 1990s. This was then superseded by Macpherson Valuation in Queenstown in 1994, which then became Mac Property in 2003.
The company became a Colliers franchise in 2008 and since then, the Otago Property Market Review and Outlook has become an established annual publication.
Start your property search
Heather Beard, Director of Valuation at Colliers Otago, oversees the publication nowadays and says it provides an impartial and objective overview of market trends over the past 12 months with forecasts for the year ahead.
"Widely regarded as an authoritative resource on property matters, approximately 3,500 complimentary copies are distributed each year," Beard says.
"The inclusion of the publication as a contemporary collection in the district museum serves as a testament to its factual integrity and the high regard in which it is held. We are incredibly proud that it has been recognised in this way."
Alastair Wood, Commercial Sales and Leasing Broker at Colliers Queenstown, says the publication has kept a close eye on trends that have emerged over the past three decades.
"The market has generally gone in 10-year cycles, peak to peak, trough to trough. The Covid-19 period was an exception to this. We were already slowing down before Covid and then the record-low interest rates kickstarted the property market again," Wood says.
"The GFC was probably the largest correction in pricing I've seen over those years. We had a period of rapid price increases leading up to that due to easy credit being available from numerous finance companies.
"With finance companies collapsing, developers were left high and dry with no funding available for half-completed projects. As a result, development land lost between 50 to 70 per cent of its value.
"Numerous apartment developments were selling down managed apartments at close to 50 per cent of their previous values. It took a long time to recover from that one.
"It's been a great ride for property in the region over the past 30 years. Whilst there's been a few bumps along the way, the capital gains have far outweighed the market corrections over the long term.
"Population growth, both resident and tourism, has been the catalyst. The real challenge going forward will be to keep up infrastructure development with growth."
Alicia Taylor, Projects Manager at the Lakes District Museum & Gallery, says the acquisition of 30 years of reports marks a significant enhancement of their documentary heritage holdings.
"We were particularly interested in the series as it offers a rare, longitudinal perspective on economic, commercial, and urban development trends in the Queenstown-Lakes District, and wider Otago, over the past three decades," Taylor says.
"For the museum, it represents a valuable primary resource that complements our existing archives related to land use, regional development, business history, and social change.
"Having this resource strengthens our ability to support researchers, historians, school groups, and members of the public who are seeking to understand factors that have influenced how development in the Queenstown-Lakes District has been shaped."
The 2025-2026 Otago Market Review and Outlook is due for release on 17 July.
- Supplied by Colliers
