If you are secure in your job and have enough money saved, now is the time to buy a house, say real estate experts.

No one should try to pinpoint the bottom of the housing market and if the price is right, the timing is perfect, says BNZ chief economist Tony Alexander.

His call sits uncomfortably with talk of recession and the worsening international outlook, but it is based on sound judgment.

"As long as I figured on keeping my job I would be out there actively looking for a property at the moment," Mr Alexander said.

"I wouldn't be hanging off simply trying to pick the low point in the house-price cycle."

Economists had proved they could not pick the top of the cycle, so no one should expect them to pick the low point, he warned.

He believes real estate sales have probably almost reached their weakest level, and activity is likely to fluctuate and start moving up before the end of the year.

House prices will possibly fall another 5 per cent, but will stabilise by the end of the year, then rise slightly next year, he says.

Buyers should be seeking a mortgage interest rate of 5.5 per cent fixed for five years.

"But as I wait for this rate, I'll become increasingly prepared to accept something just below 6 per cent just in case the world suddenly looks like a brighter place," he said.

Mr Alexander is not alone in his views.

Property author and advocate Kieran Trass is running a seminar in Remuera on March 7 on taking advantage of the crash.

He says Auckland flats are the first category of property this decade to emerge as cashflow-positive - "paying you to own them" - because of interest rates and property prices.

BIS Shrapnel's managing director, Robert Mellor, said this week the Auckland house market would reach its lowest level by May and called for banks to loosen up on lending.

Strategic Risk Analysis economist Rodney Dickens, of Whangarei, said the market was eroding the benefits of renting a house, and it now made more sense to buy.

"Only six months ago the economics were hugely in favour of renting, but with house prices having had more than half of the fall we expect and five-year fixed mortgage interest rates having fallen from 9.1 per cent to 6.5 per cent, it would be understandable if quite a few people were tempted to buy rather than rent and to lock in longer-term mortgages to give them certainty about interest costs," Mr Dickens said.