Melbourne buyers head north of the Yarra: RP Data's weekend auction preview

There are 992 auctions scheduled this week in Melbourne compared to 1008 for the same time last year (the fourteenth week with over 1,000 auction this year).

The highest volume of auctions will be in Mount Waverly with 19 expected.

After a few weeks where sellers were holding the upper hand, last week showed that they still need to ensure that their sale price expectations are not too high.

While the Melbourne market is healthy, it is recording more moderate growth than in the two previous upswings in 2007 and 2010.

September quarter property values showed that the strongest growth in house values on a suburb basis were in the inner east.

Armadale saw a 25.4% rise over the last year and similar growth was recorded in nearby Malvern East, Glen Iris and Camberwell. It is often the case that in an improving market the most expensive segment records the strongest increase in values.

It was also interesting to note that Fairfield joined its neighbor, Alphington, as a suburb with a median house value of in excess of a million dollars. Buyers who can't afford Mont Albert or Balwyn are gravitating north of the Yarra.

On a city wide basis, the time on market results for houses sold at private sale rose from 39 days to 40 days over the last week while vendor discounting fell from -5.3% to -5.1%.

Key data

• Clearance rate week ending 5 October: 69.1%
• Melbourne auctions expected week ending 12 October: 992
• Melbourne private sales time on market week ending 5 October: 40 days (houses)
• Melbourne vendor discounting market week ending 5 October: -5.1% (houses)
• Listings being prepared for market are 3.9% higher in month ending 5 October (seasonally adjusted)