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The national median rent saw its biggest annual increase in seven months with a gain of 8.5 per cent.
Rents advertised on TradeMe rose $45 to a record-breaking national median of $575 a week in February.
In Canterbury, the median rent rose 9 per cent to $480 a week.
Records were reached in Bay of Plenty, Northland and Taranaki, while the number of properties available to rent dropped 6 per cent on the year earlier.
The decrease in available properties coincided with a 4 per cent fall in demand.
In Wellington, demand was down 10 per cent and Auckland was down 12 per cent.
Wellington's median rent rose more than 12 per cent to $650 a week, while Auckland went up by just 1.7 per cent to $600.
-RNZ & Star News
