For a show about buying houses, there’s not a lot of house buying going on.
On Auckland’s North Shore, Location Location Location NZ (LLLNZ) presenters Paul Glover and Jayne Kiely are helping two families find the house of their dreams. The Coates whānau want a home to suit three generations, while Jo and John are moving to Auckland. As with every other episode of LLLNZ, Glover and Kiely show each group three different properties for sale, before meeting to find out which house the families want to purchase. It’s a tough decision, but in this episode, the answer is clear: neither family wants to buy a house.
It’s a bit weird not to buy a house on a show about buying houses, but it’s a common occurrence on our version of the popular British property series. I thought we had a deal, LLLNZ. I watch your show so I can become emotionally invested in a stranger’s hopes and dreams, and you reward me by getting people to commit on camera to an enormous mortgage and a lifetime of debt. Who cares about the lack of natural light, the motorway out the front and the stink location!? We need our happy ending.
The British version of LLL certainly knows how to entertain, with the best part of each episode taking place in the final minutes. The phone negotiations by presenters Phil Spencer and Kirstie Allsopp are emotional and tense, as we wait to find out if the buyer’s offer has been accepted. When the thrill of the acceptance call comes through, lives have changed before our very eyes, and we haven’t even left the comfort of our own couch.
But LLLNZ features househunters who have the audacity to be cautious about making the biggest financial decision of their lives. Rude! Our careful shoppers are always polite about why they don’t want any of LLLNZ’s houses, saying they’re now “considering their options” and that “they’re grateful for the help” rather than “these homes suck” or “I did not realise my long term life partner has no vision”. Paul and Jayne are ever gracious to these well-meaning time-wasters, but if the end of an LLLNZ episode doesn’t involve tears and an awkward celebratory embrace in a fake English pub, then I’m not buying it either.
Am I exaggerating? Probably, but just like a laggy housing market, the numbers don’t lie. According to highly scientific data scribbled by me on the back of an old receipt, there have been two seasons and 14 episodes of LLLNZ so far, featuring 28 groups visiting 84 different homes. Of those 28 groups, 11 agreed to either make an offer or indicated they would make an offer on one of the homes they were shown, but were ultimately unsuccessful. Three indicated they wanted to return to one of the homes for another visit, but did not make an offer, while a whopping 12 families gave Paul and Jayne a resounding “no deal” at the end of their episode.
Many families went on to buy a different home after filming had finished, but so far, only two groups have successfully bought a house they found through LLNZ. This means that 93% of LLLNZ househunters did not buy one of the homes they visited on the show.
Of course, none of this is really LLLNZ’s fault, but more a reflection on our housing market. There’s hesitancy in the current market and all signs point to the end of New Zealand’s property obsession, but while housing affordability has improved, house prices are still expensive relative to incomes. The show can’t stop other buyers from outbidding the couples or vendors refusing offers, and most houses for sale in Auckland (where the show predominantly films) are for sale by auction rather than negotiation, which reduces the opportunity for a deal to be done immediately on camera. Plus, even LLLNZ can’t help human nature and there’s no guarantee that buyers will like the homes they see – even the ones with so much garden that one married couple decided to reduce their million-dollar budget to opt for something more manageable.
But what this means is that LLLNZ misses out on those hopeful, uplifting endings that connect emotionally with viewers, which we see in almost every episode of the UK version. Instead of watching dreams come true, New Zealand audiences get “yeah, nah”. At best, we’re left with Glover getting on the blower to say “send through the sales and purchase agreement”. Requesting paperwork is as dramatic as LLLNZ gets, apart from the time one real estate agent answered Glover’s call with an alarming “I’ve gotcha”.
Back on the North Shore, Glover isn’t fazed that the Coates family want to keep looking. “I’d like to make a toast to not buying a property,” he says, adding that at least they now have clarity in their house search. He raises a glass to not buying a house on a show about buying houses, confident in his knowledge that next week, there will be two more New Zealand families looking to definitely, maybe, probably not buy a house.
Location Location Location NZ and Location Location Location both stream on TVNZ+.
