A Bay of Islands realtor is calling on home-loan grants to be released urgently before first-home buyers are squeezed out of the Northland property market entirely.
Dennis Corbett, owner of Harcourts Kerikeri, said he had a meeting with his team of 12 salespeople on Friday to see how sales to first-time buyers were progressing.
"I asked them who was working with first-home buyers at the moment - and there wasn't one."
New data from CoreLogic report on house buyer types for the third quarter of 2014 showed 13 per cent of Northland sales went to first home buyers - less than the 17 per cent nationwide figure.
Mr Corbett estimated only 10 per cent of sales went to first-home buyers in the Bay of Islands.