How much money can you make from buy-and-hold in NZ?

There’s no fixed amount. In our example, a $1 million property growing at 5% a year could make almost $745,000 over 15 years.

How long do you need to hold a property to make money?

There’s no guaranteed timeframe. Buy-and-hold investors often plan to hold for 15 to 20 years or longer to ride through flat or falling markets.

Is buy-and-hold still worth it in 2026?

It can be if you want a more hands-off, long-term strategy. But you need to be able to afford to hold the property through slower periods.

Is buy-and-hold better than flipping?

Neither is automatically better. Flipping aims to make money faster, while buy-and-hold takes longer but usually requires less hands-on work.

Property Investment

4 min read29 Sep 2026

How much money can I make from a buy-and-hold property investment strategy?

How much can you make with a buy-and-hold property strategy? See how capital growth and rental income can build wealth over 15–20 years.

OM 6921 How much money can I make from the buy and hold strategy

Author: Ben King

Ben has 14 years of experience as a mortgage advisor and background as an investment adviser.

Book free session with Ben

Reviewed by: Lance Jensen

15 years’ experience in the industry. Active property investor with $6 million+ portfolio. Financial adviser at Opes Partners.

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Property investors make money through the buy-and-hold strategy through:

rental cashflow and
the property going up in value over time

These returns are typically made over the long term.

In this article, we’ll look at how the strategy works and how much money you could make.

What is a buy-and-hold strategy?

A buy-and-hold strategy is when an investor purchases an investment property, rents it out, and holds for the long term. Often investors won’t sell their properties for 15 - 20 years or longer.

Over that time you can make money in two ways:

Capital growth – the property increases in value
Rental income – rent you receive after your costs

For investors who borrow heavily, capital growth can be a major source of long-term wealth.

The catch is that this wealth builds up inside the property. You generally can’t spend it unless you sell the property or borrow against the equity you’ve built.

That's why buy-and-hold investors usually focus on properties they expect to grow in value over the long term.

The strategy is also relatively hands-off compared with others. It doesn’t take as much of an investor’s time, whereas investors who renovate, developer or flip properties often need to invest much more time into their properties.

Here are the main pros and cons of the buy-and-hold property investment strategy:

Pros	Cons
Less time required from you	Can take time to build substantial wealth
Fewer renovation and resale risks	Capital growth isn’t guaranteed
Can fit around your day job	May require a cashflow top-up
Less specialist knowledge required	Wealth is tied up in the property
No renovation budget required	Can take longer to build your portfolio

More from Opes:

So, how much money can I actually make with buy-and-hold?

Let’s say you buy a $1 million investment property.

We’ll assume you borrow the full $1 million using equity in your own home rather than putting in a cash deposit.

If the property grows at 5% a year, after 15 years it would be worth just over $2 million.

The real equity growth in this example is just under $745,000.

Here are the assumptions:

	Assumption
Starting property value	$1,000,000
Mortgage	$1,000,000
Capital growth	5% a year
Inflation	2.5%
Real equity growth	$744,963

What does a buy-and-hold strategy look like in real life?

Investors Lynne and Darren chose a classic buy-and-hold strategy. This is because they wanted to gradually build wealth for retirement.

They were nearly mortgage-free on their own home but realised they were “frittering” money away and could be doing something more useful with it.

So they used their home equity to buy two investment properties, then later added a third.

Around 10 years later the three properties had increased in value by about $665,000 in total. One had increased by roughly $250,000, another by $275,000 and the third by $140,000.

Their plan isn’t to sell all three the moment they retire.

Instead, they expect to gradually sell properties, use some of the money to live on, and reduce debt while giving their remaining investments more time to grow.

That's buy-and-hold in practice ... it isn’t necessarily about one huge payday.

It’s about building an asset base over a long period, then eventually turning some of that wealth into money you can use.

Of course, Lynne and Darren’s experience is not a guaranteed result.

What you make depends on what you buy, where you buy, how long you hold the property and what happens in the market.

Property prices don’t rise by 5% or 6% every year. Some years they rise faster, other years they barely move or fall.

Action Points – What you can actually do

If you’re considering a buy-and-hold strategy:

Work out how long you’re prepared to invest for. Ideally, think in decades rather than years.
Run the numbers before you buy. Make sure you can afford any cashflow top-up, particularly in the early years.
Don’t rely on a single capital growth assumption. Run a few scenarios to see what happens if your property grows faster or slower than expected.
Have an end strategy. Think about how you’ll eventually turn the equity you’ve built into usable money whether that’s selling, reducing debt, or living off the rental cashflow.

How does the buy-and-hold strategy compare with other property investing strategies?

Buy-and-hold investors generally wait for the property market to increase the value of their property over time.

More active investors try to create that value themselves.

For example, a BRRRR investor might buy a property for $500,000, spend $50,000 renovating, and end up with a property worth $600,000.

If everything goes to plan, they’ve created $50,000 of additional equity before other costs.

Caption: These are ballpark examples, not guaranteed returns. Risk and capital requirements are relative to the other strategies shown.
	Buy-and-hold	Flip	Subdivision
Typical return used in our examples	5–6% p.a. capital growth	$35,000 after tax per project	$70,000 after tax per project
How long it takes	10+ years	4-9 months per project	9-18 months per project
Capital required	Low-medium	Medium-high	High
Relative risk	Medium	High	High

Should I use a buy-and-hold strategy?

Buy-and-hold is the strategy many property investors in New Zealand use.

It’s a simple strategy where, in our example, a $1 million property could potentially make almost $745,000 in today’s dollars over 15 years.

The upside is that you don’t have to spend those 15 years renovating houses, hunting for your next deal, or managing development projects.

For the right investor, that simplicity is the appeal.

You don’t have to get rich quickly; you give yourself time to build wealth slowly.

Key takeaways

Buy-and-hold mainly builds wealth through capital growth and rental cashflow
Much of that wealth sits as equity until you sell or refinance
Investors often hold for 15 to 20 years or longer
Returns depend on what and where you buy, market performance and how long you hold
It’s slower than flipping or subdivision, but generally requires less hands-on work

Ben King

Ben has 14 years of experience as a mortgage advisor and background as an investment adviser.

Ben brings a wealth of experience to the table with his 14 years as a mortgage advisor and background as an investment adviser. His dedication to helping clients reach their financial goals is central to his work.

Book free session with Ben View Profile

Ok, now for the legal bit:

This article is for your general information. It’s not financial advice. See here for details about our Financial Advice Provider Disclosure. So Opes isn’t telling you what to do with your own money.

We’ve made every effort to make sure the information is accurate. But we occasionally get the odd fact wrong. Make sure you do your own research or talk to a financial adviser before making any investment decisions.

You might like to use us or another financial adviser

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How much money can I make from a buy-and-hold property investment strategy?

What is a buy-and-hold strategy?

So, how much money can I actually make with buy-and-hold?