Nick Goodall

I know you're not mortgage advisors, and so you're not talking about the financing yourself, but it's such a key factor for people coming through the houses or maybe even people listing their property.

So what I'm interested in is...

What have the conversations sounded like this year, given that expectation now of interest rates changing?

We saw in the report and the responses, because the report or the survey actually straddled an OCR decision from the Reserve Bank, responses that were returned prior to the OCR decision at the end of November, and that decision, as a reminder, was to cut the OCR by 25 basis points to 2.25%.

Before that cut, people expected there'd be that one, plus one more in 2026.

After that cut, and then of course the full statement from Reserve Bank, that number dialed back a bit.

So it went from like 57% to 43%, expecting a further cut in 2026.

I suspect, now we've got inflation data, which was a bit high,

would probably say no one will expect to cut this year.

And in fact, it's all about when that OCR conversation or OCR starts to lift this year.

But that's kind of the core of it, the OCR.

How have conversations gone?

Are your people you're engaging with mindful of this?

Does it make them want to lock on a bit sooner before interest rates start to go?

James, do you want to tell us about your experience first?

That's intriguing, right?

And I think that's something we've talked about in the past.

When you give or take away grants for first home buyers, that doesn't actually affect how many buyers are.

It just depicts how long they take or short they take to get at the market.

Or like you said, they just lift their expectations or if they have to drag it back, they do.