"Once the market median price surpasses April's high of $305,000, we'll really be going."
The July median price was $292,000, up 9 per cent on July 2014 and 4 per cent on June.
"Aucklanders are making their presence felt across the region, mainly as investors, although the number of first-home buyers is also rising," REINZ chief executive Colleen Milne said.
Mr Tremain said "rock-bottom" interest rates and an increasing number of out-of-town investors was proving a powerful cocktail.
Sotheby's International Realty reported a swing towards out-of-towners buying Havelock North property, who made 60 per cent of purchases in the year to July. Napier remained 50/50.
Property Broker Hawke's Bay manager Paul Whitaker said August was proving to be "a very competitive" month for the market and August sales figures looked to be similar to July's. "We are urging people, if they are thinking of making a real estate decision, to do it sooner rather than later."
Elanor MacDonald, managing director of Leaders real estate firm, said July was the busiest month for the Hawke's Bay market since 2008 when it "fell off the cliff".
At the current rate of sale there was a two-month supply of houses, apart from the top-end, she said. An increasing number of out-of-town investors were avoiding lower-priced houses, despite their superior yield, and buying houses priced above average.
"Maybe they are comparing them with Auckland and looking for a nicer property and a better tenant."
The market had "just about came back to normality" before the Reserve Bank imposed lending restrictions last year.
"They were like a big handbrake on our market."
She hoped "gloomy" national economic forecasts would not be another constraint.
"It is definitely a new frontier for us."
Harcourts Hawke's Bay managing director Kaine Wilson said the local market was very positive and it was inevitable the law of supply and demand would lift prices further.
Higher prices had "flushed out" tentative sellers and would encourage new listings "but we are all very much selling very much more than we are listing".
The demand would continue.
"We are still seeing multiple offers and good attendance at auctions - that is very encouraging for prices still being on the increase," he said.
The median time it took to sell a property in July was 44 days, down from 52 in June.
The national median price in July was $465,000, up $49,000 on July 2014 and 3.3 per cent up on June. Auckland's rocketing upward trend in prices dipped 2.6 per cent in July to a median of $735,000, compared with June.
