It's official - New Zealand has the most unaffordable housing in the world, according to The Economist.

Across five different measures, New Zealand has come out on top of three of the five measures for the most expensive global housing market.

New Zealand has had the highest rise in house prices, costs the most against the average person's income and now has the biggest difference between house prices and renting prices.

In the latest edition of The Economist, figures show that in the past 46 years New Zealand's house prices have risen by more than 8 percent on average a year.

It's a trend repeated among other first world countries, including the United Kingdom, which had a 7.65 percent average rise annually over the same timeframe, and Australia, where house prices rose more than 6.4 percent a year on average.

According to The Economist, those numbers have remained solid in the past seven years with New Zealand's numbers showing a 7.9 percent consistent increase per year since 2009.

The Economist puts this trend down to "a growing horde of rich foreigners" coming to New Zealand because they see it as a "safe haven".

"In 2016 overseas investors bought just 3 percent of all properties. But their purchases were concentrated at the expensive end of the market, which is growing fast: sales involving homes worth more than NZ$1m increased by 21 percent."

The findings don't get any better for New Zealanders, showing that in the last 10 years, the average price against a person's income has risen dramatically.

The numbers are backed up by the Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey released in January showing Auckland is ranked the forth least-affordable housing market in the world.

The average house price in Auckland is now more than $1 million.

Newshub.