How long have your neighbours lived on your street? For a growing share of the country, the answer is: not long. In 2025, New Zealanders lodged 176,229 new rental bonds. That's the highest count since 2011, and it means more than 176,000 households packed up, signed a fresh tenancy agreement and moved in somewhere new in a single year (Source: Tenancy Services (MBIE), rental-bonds-regional).

Rewind and you can see how we got here. In 1994 the figure was 103,659. Through the late nineties it climbed hard, adding nearly 17,000 in 1996 alone as the rental market ballooned. By 2009 it peaked at 184,503, the busiest year for new tenancies this country has ever recorded.

Then came the long slide. From 2016 onwards, bond lodgements fell every single year until 2020, dropping from 176,187 to 150,114. That's roughly 26,000 fewer tenancies started annually, a 15 percent collapse in churn. Rents were rising fast, vacancy was scarce and moving was expensive. People stayed where they were because they had no choice. Lockdowns froze the market further.

The recovery has been steady and then sudden. 2021 barely moved. 2022 added 3,000, 2023 another 2,100, 2024 a healthier 5,700. Then 2025 jumped by 14,964 in one year. You have to go back to 1996 to find a bigger annual increase.

So who's winning? Renters, at least in the short run. A surge in new tenancies is what a loosening market looks like. When landlords are competing, tenants shop around, chase a cheaper listing, leave the flat with the mould problem instead of enduring it. The five years from 2016 to 2020 were the opposite: a market so tight that people simply couldn't move. Churn is a sign of options.

Who's losing? Anyone who thought they'd have bought by now. Bond lodgements have climbed 26,115 since 2020 while the country's population has grown far more slowly. More households are renting, and renting repeatedly. Every one of those 176,229 moves costs money: bond, a fortnight's rent in advance, a van, time off work. Multiply that across a year and it is an enormous transfer of cash out of the pockets of people who have the least of it.

And there's the quieter cost. A neighbourhood that turns over this quickly is one where fewer people know the names three doors down. Community memory is built by people staying. We are, by this measure, back to 2011 levels of not staying.

The 2009 peak of 184,503 is still ahead of us. On current trajectory, we'll be there inside two years.