I was in NZ and Australia all of last January, and their RE markets were as bubbly as ours. But their interest rates on homes, about 6 – 8% were dampening speculation more responsibly than ours. Still, their prices had had a big runup to silly levels, and the conversations with locals often turned to RE price appreciation.
Looking forward, the two countries will likely get clobbered by the fact that they are big natural resource and tourism-based economies, and will fare badly in the current commodities collapse accompanying world-wide recession.
