Hah! I live in Christchurch too, and yes, rents have gone up, and yes, like everyone I've been thinking about buying. However! I'm also from Ireland where a _l

Hah! I live in Christchurch too, and yes, rents have gone up, and yes, like everyone I've been thinking about buying. However! I'm also from Ireland where a _lot_ of my friends bought houses in the celtic tiger era and are now, on average, about 100K euro down on their "investments" My gut feeling is that Christchurch too is a bubble. Sure it's a bubble fuelled by a nasty earthquake reducing the supply... BUT supply will come back up again (and it'll be new housing with things like insulation!) Tricky things really. Currently my rent is cheaper than a mortgage for an equivalent - but only just. That said, I don' t have to pay rates, fees, hiked insurance etc. The other option of course is to leave for a while - easy enough to do as a decent developer.