Speed of Sydney and Melbourne sales to continue to push prices higher: CoreLogic
Homes in Sydney and Melbourne are selling faster than in the previous month and demand will continue to prop up house prices, according to CoreLogic's latest weekly report.
The property advisory firm says that using vendor discount and time on market metrics measures to gauge current market conditions can highlight the relative strength of cities' property markets.
CoreLogic research analyst Cameron Kusher suggests "the vendor discounting metric looks at properties selling for less than their original list price and looks at the percentage difference from initial list price to ultimate sale price". The time on market metric "shows the average number of days between when a property is first listed and when it ultimately sells".
It’s important to note that each of these measures is based on private treaty sales and therefore excludes auctions.
In September 2016, the average days on market across the combined capital cities was recorded at 39 days.
At the same time a year earlier, the average days on market was a slightly lower 36 days.
Over recent years homes have been selling much quicker in Sydney and Melbourne than they have across the other capital cities, Kusher said.
Homes in Hobart and Canberra have seen fairly large falls in days on market over the past year.
"This aligns with accelerating value growth in the Hobart and Canberra housing markets," Kusher said. "In Perth and Darwin homes have seen a large rise in the average days on market as selling conditions have become tougher and values have declined."
"In September 2016, a typical home sold at a discount from its original listing price was discounted by -5.7% across the combined capital cities. In comparison, at the same time a year earlier, the typical level of discounting was recorded at -6.0%. The lower level of discounting is reflective of more demand and fewer homes for sale but is also likely to reflect more realistic initial listing prices from vendors."
Sydney and Melbourne, along with Canberra, have been seeing low levels of discounting by vendors over recent years.
Kusher said: "In particular, Sydney and Melbourne have shown strong housing demand which has led to many homes selling in excess of their initial list price. Despite only moderate growth in values over recent years Canberra has consistently recorded low levels of discounting. In Perth and Darwin as the housing market has wakened over recent years discounting levels have increased significantly.
"With combined capital city home values increasing for almost four and a half years (mainly in Sydney and Melbourne), the level of discounting and time on market remains extremely low and is being driven by ongoing strong housing demand coupled with relatively low stock levels.
"While these conditions persist, it is difficult to see how home values in Sydney and Melbourne in particular, won’t continue to increase."
