House prices here are now at record levels - with houses in one Napier suburb now a quarter-of-a-million-dollars dearer than just two years ago.
Latest statistics from the Real Estate Institute show a thriving Central Hawke's Bay market has pushed the region's median house price up to $420,000.
While the region was one of seven to post a new record median last month, the 258 houses sold last month was also the second highest number of properties sold for the month of November in the last decade.
With investors making up less than 5 per cent of the local market, Reinz chief executive Bindi Norwell said it appeared investors were increasingly selling rather than buying.
"There has been a decrease in activity from investors across the Hawke's Bay region on the buying front and we are still facing a shortage of listings in average price brackets, however, there is plenty of selection in the over $700,000 range.
"Investors are more actively looking to sell their investment properties which indicates they are concerned about potential and upcoming changes announced by the new Government."
The median house price in Wairoa fell from $172,000 to $120,00 but elsewhere there were big rises with Central Hake's Bay seeing the biggest increase - up $80,000 to $320,000.
Houses in Napier remain the most expensive, following a $76,000 increase from the same month last year, while the average median in Hastings is now $406,000 - up $46,250 on the same time last year.
Further statistics supplied to Hawke's Bay Today show Napier's Ahuriri has seen huge jumps in prices. The median price there last month hit $710,000 - up $250,000 from November 2015.
Similarly over the past two years, house prices in the Hastings-Havelock North ward went up from $315,000 in November 2015, to $415,000 last month, while Taradale in Napier went up $125,00 over the same two-year period to $529,000.
Ms Norwell said the large increases in certain wards were probably a driver behind the region's year-on-year growth figure of 19 per cent.
"Ahuriri has experienced quite a lot of growth, it obviously depends on each ward and there are some areas that are particularly growing up quickly.
"If you break that down, the Central Hawke's Bay Area went up 33 per cent, Hastings up 12 per cent, Napier up 19 per cent and the Wairoa down 30 per cent, so it does depend which part of the region we are talking about."
"The Hawke's Bay area has had huge growth but also we've had, looking at the net migration statistics, there's been a 31 per cent increase in net migration year-to-year between September 2016 to September 2017.
"That's phenomenal. There's a lot of people moving to the area, which is probably why there has been such demand for properties."
Moves to improve to region's infrastructure and a rise in commercial developments were also helping bring people to the area.
"It's a great place to live, there's great schools, economically the region is doing well and housing affordability is at reasonable levels as well. For example, in some areas of Auckland you can get 27 times the salary versus your house price, whereas in Hawke's Bay it's 6.4 times your salary versus your house price, so it's much more affordable."
However, housing supply was an issue.
"The region has the second lowest level of inventory across New Zealand with just 11 weeks of supply, the same as in November 2016."
Nationally, median prices across New Zealand rose 1.9 per cent in November to $540,000
Auckland's median price increased 3.8 per cent to $880,000 – up from $848,149 in October and 0.6 per cent year-on-year.