Only 1 per cent of New Zealanders unaffected by house prices, says Little

Rising housing prices affect nearly every Kiwi, says Labour. Photo / File

House prices have risen faster than wages in all but four regions in New Zealand, according to analysis by the Labour Party.

Those regions - Grey District, Masterton, Westland and Wairoa - contain just 1.25 per cent of the population, Labour leader Andrew Little said.

That meant more than 98 per cent of the population was being affected by high house prices, he said.

Following its housing policy announcements on the weekend, Labour launched an interactive map today to give more information about how house price inflation was affecting different parts of the country.

The Labour analysis, based on Quotable Value and Statistics New Zealand data, showed that the highest average house price was in Auckland's eastern suburbs, at $1.4 million.

The lowest was in Kawerau, where the average house price was $131,000.

Housing Minister Nick Smith said Labour's use of the data was "riddled with errors and misinformation."

Smith said Little's claim that 98 per cent of the country had a housing crisis was "not credible."

"This definition would mean almost every region of New Zealand was in crisis for all of Labour's nine years in government, during which house prices rose 102 per cent and wages 44 per cent."

Although the data is drawn from official sources such as the 2013 Census, Smith said it gave misleading results such as delivering home ownership figures only for a city or town centre rather than the whole town.

The data also showed that the shortage of homes in Auckland was also affecting regions outside of the city.

Prices in Hamilton's southwestern suburbs rose 29.8 per cent in the past year, the fastest in the country.

In the Bay of Plenty, rents rose by 9.5 per cent in the year to March.

Little said the housing costs appeared to be making inequality worse.

Homeownership in Waitemata had fallen to below 40 per cent.

The highest ownership rate was in Waimakariri, where 80 per cent of households owned their own home.