Household confidence in the regional economy is "down in the dumps" according to new research.
Northland's household confidence was down at -32 percent. Photo: RNZ / MARIKA KHABAZI
The Westpac McDermott Miller Consumer Confidence Survey shows all regions are feeling the impacts of tough economic times.
The increase in the cost of living is tipped to be the driving factor of pessimism in regional economies.
Westpac economist Nathan Penny said it was a grim picture.
"That all regions are in pessimistic territory is quite revealing and I don't think we have ever seen that in history.
"It is an indication of some key drivers impacting everyone across all regions."
Auckland saw the largest decline in the survey, plunging to -37 percent.
Northland sits close behind at -32 percent which Penny partially attributed to Covid-19 constraints.
"They battled meat processing capacity issues with many workers taking time off due to Omicron.
"That meant it was really hard for farmers to send their stock to meat processing plants and that did cause a lot of issues for farmers over what is normally the busy period."
Penny said seasonal elements such as droughts had affected many regions.
However, he believed there would be a bounce back in the provinces.
"That's based off the fact that our agriculture, horticulture and viticulture - they're doing very well.
"That's likely to underpin incomes in those regions in comparison to urban centres in particular Wellington and Auckland which we do expect to underperform."
The Nelson area dipped further into negative territory in the June quarter, now sitting at -12 percent.
That was despite the region's housing market holding up better than most.
However, Nelson Chamber of Commerce chief executive Ali Boswijk said the results were not surprising.
"We are a region of exporters and we know export is still very difficult and that supply chains are still very disrupted and costs are going up quite significantly with that.
"Also we know that we are in a place where there is a lot of construction happening and there is a lot of increased costs related to almost every single aspect of that at the moment."
However, Boswijk shared the sentiment of Penny - international and domestic tourists would be the country's saving grace.
Otago was the least pessimistic region and saw the biggest improvement for the quarter, bolstered up by the return of tourism.