If you bought a median-priced house in Auckland at the end of 2013, you would have paid just over $500,000. Six years later, even during a slump in the city's market, that same house would have been worth more than $800,000.
With an affordability crunch, tighter lending criteria and more restrictions on investors, New Zealanders are being told not to expect increases like that over the next few years.
But there are still pockets of strong price rises around the country - Gisborne prices increased $2645 a day between April and May.
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So, if you're looking for capital gains in the next few years, where should you buy?
Nick Goodall, head of research, at Corelogic, said people should try to understand the local economy in the area.
"The wider Wellington area - an area I'm most familiar with - looks to have a reasonable outlook with strong employment, assisted by the Labour-NZ First Government.
"There has been consistently strong demand for buying properties, coinciding with a lack of properties for sale, as well as renting properties, assisted by things such as universities. Dunedin is similar recently with the economy boosted by the building of the new hospital there."
Tom Lintern, chief data scientist at Homes.co.nz, said he would be surprised if small North Island towns continued their run of increases over the next three years.
"My pick for the next few years is Christchurch as, unlike other New Zealand cities, prices have not risen significantly in the last five years or so. The remainder of earthquake-damaged properties will finally be repaired or replaced leaving higher value housing stock and the infrastructure investment in the city will continue attracting more people to the region."
Brad Olsen, economist at Infometrics, said he saw potential in Hawke's Bay and Auckland. Hawke's Bay's median price has shot up over the past decade, from less than $300,000 in 2013 to $470,000.
"For the Hawke's Bay, we're still coming to the tail-end of the boom, and there's still a lot of demand in some parts of the country for housing," Olsen said.
"Auckland's an interesting one: the current affordability issues have seen prices head lower recently, but we still expect that the Super City is undersupplied, meaning that there is scope for further price growth. The issue will be which constraint wins out: higher prices because demand for housing exceeds current supply, or will actual affordability restrain price growth over the next three years, also noting that although mortgage lending is cheaper now, it won't always be that way."
Andrew King, executive officer of the New Zealand Property Investors Federation, said he still expected subdued growth in most parts of the country.
"Any above-average growth will likely come fr
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