Technology & climate change — the changing shape of rating valuations
QV has been at the heart of nearly every property transaction in New Zealand for more than 125 years and counting. Naturally, there’s been a great deal of evolution in the rating valuation space in this time, with technology and climate change being the primary agents of change in recent years.
With increasing technology available to rating valuers, it’s vitally important that valuation service providers, like QV, are constantly innovating to ensure that the rating valuation process is able to benefit from this new technology.
Tools now utilised within the rating valuation process include:
- Access to large data sets and analytics
- Advanced models and modelling techniques
- Self-built valuation technologies for in-field data capture and report generation
- Advanced mapping, including GIS and Lidar
- Access to council plans and specifications, post line inspection etc.
We’re constantly driving process and technological improvements to connect people to the information they need, when and wherever they need it.
In the last couple of years alone, QV has pioneered real-time valuation technology, developed a new thematic mapping tool that gives valuers and councils greater visibility during a revaluation, and made our objection process simpler and easier to understand with an enhanced report delivered to objectors via a secure folder on QV.co.nz.
Further advancements in our core valuation system and improved rural sales analysis with improved rural property datasets continue to allow our teams to perform their work with an even greater understanding of the latest property data.
The implications of climate change
The climate is changing around us, and so rating valuations may also need to change to remain fit for purpose in the future. Over the last 10 years, New Zealand has been subject to a range of extreme weather events – most notably Cyclone Gabrielle last year.
As a direct result of this extreme weather event, the Government proposed an Order in Council under the Severe Weather Emergency Recovery Legislation Act 2023 to temporarily amend the definition of Capital Value in the Rating Valuations Act so that cyclone damage did not have to be considered when assessing the revaluation of Hastings district properties.
As rating values are so visible, and easily accessed, they have been considered in some situations for compensation to damaged properties. This has resulted in the need to raise the quality of rating valuations. However, as a rating valuation is set at a point in time, this can result in difficult situations for homeowners – particularly if significant damage occurs to a property a year after the effective revaluation date.
So valuation service providers will need to continue to work in collaboration with climate change and natural hazard data providers, as well as councils, to ensure that the impact of such hazards, events and forecasts are able to be considered in the future.
We are already actively considering these challenges as a business and how to address them.
