SPONSORED POST
At Assemble, our Salary Guide is a reflection of what’s happening across the property sector, built from the real conversations we have every day with clients and candidates across New Zealand. As long-standing partners of Property Council NZ, we know this guide has become an industry reference point, and that comes with a responsibility to ensure the data is accurate, relevant, and genuinely useful.
This year’s edition covers the full breadth of the market across property, development, investment, property finance, construction, civil, infrastructure, and engineering. We have also welcomed Leonie Freeman’s perspective to this year’s edition which adds an invaluable and uniquely located view of the market to the guide.
Three months into 2026, the market had shifted into a more positive place. Capital was moving, development pipelines were being rebuilt, and hiring conversations that had stalled through much of 2025 were restarting. Businesses were thinking more proactively about growth, then the conflict in the Middle East reintroduced a level of caution the market had only just started to shake, and that early momentum slowed.
The salary ranges and insights in this guide are shaped by what we saw before those events and what we expect to see as conditions settle, giving a more complete picture than data tied to a single moment. The underlying conditions driving confidence earlier in the year haven’t changed structurally. Interest rates are lower, infrastructure investment is building, development pipelines are reforming, and demand for skilled professionals across property, construction, and engineering is real and growing. What the current uncertainty is doing is delaying decisions and our view is that as things settle, those earlier signs of confidence will return and likely at pace.
That is an important distinction; the talent market had already tightened and it has stayed tight. Good people have largely been retained through the cycle, while there has also been a meaningful outflow of experienced professionals to Australia, where stronger pipelines and higher salaries proved difficult to turn down. Most key skills covering investment, development, project delivery and asset management are in short supply, and as more opportunities emerge across the market, the organisations that haven’t been thinking ahead will find themselves competing hard for a limited pool of people. The Assemble Salary guide is designed to provide a practical and honest view of where salaries sit today, where the pressure points are building, and how to position your business to hire well when the market moves.
Like any market-facing resource, it should be read with the understanding that conditions can change. What remains consistent is the value of making well-informed hiring decisions. We hope this edition gives you a solid foundation to do that.
