Slowing market convincing home owners to stay put

The slowing property market conditions along with increased costs of moving are triggered a big jump in stay-putters.

RP Data says the typical hold property period has jumped from 6.8 years to 8.6 years over the past decade.

Melbourne and Sydney home owners tend to remain in their homes the longest, according to RP Data research analyst Cameron Kusher.

"This is likely due to higher purchase prices of homes which then results in higher transaction costs," Kusher says.

But the cheaper capital cities including Darwin, Adelaide and Hobart now tend to sell homes on a more frequent basis.

Monash in southeast Melbourne has the longest average hold period among the sellers of last year, at 12.6 years.

The mining region of Port Hedland in northwest Western Australia had the nation's shortest average hold period over the past year at just 4.7 years.

"Mining regions feature heavily in the list of regions with the shortest average hold period," Kusher says.

The longer period of time between sales was also a growing phenomenon with units.

Ten years ago, the average Australian unit was selling after an average of 6.1 years, and now it is 7.5 years, Kusher says.

RP Data calculates the average hold period as the average time frame between actual residential property sales, therefore excluding those who continue to hold.