22 May 2017

A Big Weekend for Australia’s Property Market

It may be mid-May, a period when activity in Australia’s property market typically slows down, but that’s not the case this year. Thousands of properties will go under the hammer this weekend, providing the latest litmus test of buyer demand.

And given sentiment towards whether now is a good time to buy fell heavily in the latest Westpac-MI consumer sentiment survey for May, there’s likely to be more eyes on the results than usual.

According to CoreLogic, 2,619 properties will go under the hammer, 210 more than last week and well above the 1,920 in the same week a year ago. As usual, most are in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia’s largest housing markets.

“Auction activity across Melbourne and Sydney, the two major auction markets, is expected to increase, with 1,222 Melbourne homes to go to auction, rising from last week’s 1,098, and 1,003 auctions scheduled across Sydney, up from last week’s 960,” said CoreLogic.

According to the group, a final auction clearance rate of 72.8% was achieved across Australia’s capitals last week, down marginally on the 73% level reported previously. Sydney and Melbourne continued to outperform other capital cities, logging clearance rates of 74.5% and 75.0% respectively.