An economy forecaster says that real estate agents that leave the sector, are unlikely to return

It comes as an OIA request from Stuff reports a drop in the number of active real estate agents by 235 over the last quarter.

At the end of March, there were just over 17-thousand agents, but that number has now dropped slightly below 17-thousand.

Infometrics Chief Forecaster Gareth Kiernan says the main driver of real estate agents leaving is lower sales volumes numbers.

He says sales activity is down around 30 percent from mid-2001, and although house prices have come back by 15 percent, the number of sales is more dramatic.