Melbourne's auction superiority emerges ahead of spring sales

Melbourne was again the busiest and the best auction locality on the last weekend in July.

There were 943 auctions held across Melbourne on the weekend with a preliminary clearance rate of 77.2 per cent, increasing from a final clearance rate of 73.8 per cent last week across 833 auctions.

Over the same week last year, Melbourne’s clearance rate was 75.3 per cent across 754 auctions.

Of the nine Melbourne sub-regions, five recorded clearance rates above 80.0 per cent, with the highest clearance recorded across the Mornington Peninsula, with preliminary results showing 87.2 per cent of the 39 results were successful followed by the North West where 81.3 per cent of auctions cleared.

A French-style Balwyn house sold for $3.812 million making it Melbourne’s most expensive weekend auction sale.

Located at 27 Burroughs Road, the 2012 built home was last sold in 2013 for $3.27 million.

The property was offered through VicProp agents Jack Zhang and Janssen Xiang.

In Sydney, 704 properties were taken to auction this week with a preliminary clearance rate of 68 per cent.

"Last week, the final clearance rate for the city was 70.3 per cent across 625 auctions, after sitting below the 70 per cent mark for the previous six weeks, so it will be interesting to see what the final clearance rate is like," Kevin Brogan, CoreLogic's auction analyst said.

Looking at a wider trend of numbers, the second quarter growth has been weaker than the first quarter, CoreLogic's head of research Tim Lawless said.

Melbourne is now the absolute standout performer for 12-month growth, he noted.

“While it overtook Sydney a little earlier in 2017 it is now well and truly entrenched in that spot.

“The median in Sydney is now $1.05 million, while in Melbourne it is $755,000, so we are talking about a difference of $300,000,” he told The Herald Sun.

This time last year ago, 509 Sydney homes were taken to auction for a 78 per cent success rate.

This week, the performance across Sydney’s individual sub regions was mixed.

Across the South West region, where 47 of the 50 results have been reported so far, the preliminary clearance rate was 40.4 per cent, while across the Eastern suburbs it was 90 per cent and 81.8 per cent in the Inner West.

Sydney's top sale was a refurbished pre-Federation Killara house.

It sold for $5.26 million making it Sydney’s most expensive weekend auction sale.

Located at 4 Stanhope Road, the 1890 the property was last sold in 2013 for $3.722 million.

There were five bedrooms, three of them having their own ensuite, a study and 1000 bottle wine cellar.

The property was offered through McGrath agents Brent Courtney and Sarah Davis.

Domain calculated the Sydney house price weekend median was $1,405,000 and $859,000 for apartments.

It was $860,000 for Melbourne's median auction house price and $588,000 for apartments.

The last weekend of July saw another slight increase in preliminary auction clearance rate, according to CoreLogic.

The combined capital city preliminary clearance rate was recorded at 70.7 per cent this week, up slightly from last week, when the final clearance rate sat at 69.9 per cent.

Auction volumes were higher with 1,957 homes across the combined capital cities, up from 1,748 last week, and significantly higher than this time last year when 1,610 auctions were held.

There were 158 Brisbane homes taken to auction this week, with 116 results reported so far.

The Brisbane clearance rate was 53.4 per cent, up from 46.4 per cent last week and higher than one year ago, when 48.5 per cent of the 156 properties taken to auction were successful.

A four bedroom period Bowen Hills house sold for $1.475 million making it Brisbane’s most expensive weekend auction sale.

The 31 Cintra Road offering had been held by the same family for around nine decades - sold for the first time since it’s 1925 construction.

The property, with views to Mt Coot-tha, was offered through LJ Hooker agents Brett Greensill and Jermaine Jones.

Adelaide saw a preliminary clearance rate of 64.3 per cent, with 56 reported results across a total of 80 scheduled auctions.

In comparison, over the previous week Adelaide’s clearance rate was 66.7 per cent and 68.8 per cent one year ago.

There were 25 Perth auctions this week and so far 15 results have been reported, with 26.7 per cent selling.

Canberra’s preliminary auction clearance rate of 74.4 per cent across 47 auctions is higher than both last week, when the final auction clearance rate was 71.8 per cent, and last year (74.3 per cent).

A five bedroom Peter Byfield-designed Red Hill house sold for $2.9 million making it Canberra’s most expensive weekend auction sale.

Located at 58 Endeavour Street, (above) the two-storey residence was offered through Luton Properties agents Richard Luton and Sophie Luton.