Houses Sales Surge in Autumn Real Estate Market

The Australian property market has seen to be flying even now that the second quarter of the year is fast approaching. Compared to the same time last year, the number of properties sold to homebuyers has significantly increased, pointing to a strong selling season in the autumn real estate market.

According to realestate.com.au, there were 6,556 sold properties during the first week of March while there were only 4,852 in the same week in 2020. Similarly, sales volumes were up 32% nationally over the first 10 weeks of 2021, compared to last year’s statistics. Some of the states that experienced this increase are Victoria and Queensland which both had more than 30% increase in the number of properties sold, New South Wales which had a 27% jump, and the Northern Territory which had the highest increase in property sales at 65%.

Cameron Kusher, who is the Director of economic research at realestate.com.au, said the positive sales volume are the results of the current high demand for residential properties, and that he has high expectations that these strong sales figures will at least remain throughout the rest of this year. 

“Supply levels remain low and demand is unprecedented, which is resulting in properties selling quickly and sales volumes lifting significantly,” Mr Kusher said.

“I believe we’re going to see a strong autumn season. Stock supply remains low and while it may increase, it seems unlikely the uplift will be sufficient to offset the current strength of demand,” he added.

“I would suspect sales volumes will slow where there is a significant and sustained lift in supply, which may not actually occur until next year.”

“Buyer Demand Remains Close to its Historic High Levels”

Based on realestate.com.au, the buyer demand slipped by 1% nationally for two consecutive weeks and is now down 2.4% from its peak. However, high-intent buyer demand is up 39.9% on last year, which was the third highest on record, based on the Insights Weekly Buyer Demand Report that was recently released.

Among the states, Western Australia was the only one to buck the trend with rising demands for properties. Mr Kusher said demand for property remains very strong with prices and sales volumes increasing.

“I expect that little will change over the coming weeks with demand likely to remain close to its historic high levels,” he said.

In addition, although the buyer search volumes dropped across every state and territory in the first week of March, it remained 51% higher compared to 2020, according to the REA Insights Weekly Property Search Report.

The Only Way is Up for Property Prices

Mr. Kusher said house prices in Australia have been growing since mid-20 due to strong buyer demand, low stock and historic low borrowing rates. He also added that price growth will likely continue throughout the year, based on the inaugural REA Insights Home Price Index report this month.

According to the report, national dwelling prices increased by 0.4% annually in February 2021, taking them 5.9% higher than they were in February last year. Capital city prices grew by 0.4% and regional prices rose by 0.3%.

While it may be hard to predict what will happen to house prices in the long run, Mr Kusher said they don’t look to be slowing down this year.

“There’s going to be strong price increases for the rest of this year and it could be as much as double-digit growth through 2021.”