National vendor hibernation continues into July, especially in Sydney: SQM

Sydney maintains the greatest fall in online property listings with a 17% decline over the past year, as Sydney and national levels continued, not unexpectedly, to fall during July.

Across the country, the number of properties listed for sale online fell during July by 2.1% with Sydney mirroring the decline to sit at 27,973 listings, according to data providers, SQM Research.

There were a total of 351,487 properties listed online over July, down 2.5% from July last year, SQM's Louis Christopher noted.

Year on year, every capital city except Canberra and Melbourne recorded decreases in property advertised for sale.

National property listings peaked in November 2012 and have fallen since then. Sydney's property listings peaked one year earlier and have continued to remain at lower than prior years.

"It's pretty clear that the Sydney trend is a far more pronounced than the national trend," Christopher told Property Observer.

The biggest decrease in listings in Sydney was in the CBD where they fell 28.4% over the year. The lower north shore fell 26.2%, the northern beaches fell 26.4% and the eastern suburbs fell 25.3%.

Christopher says these decreases potentially point to a pick-up in the Australian housing market though it still believes the level of stock is elevated at a national level.

“It is becoming more and more evident that the housing market is beginning to pick up in this capital city and SQM Research believes that this will continue into the Spring selling season,” Christopher says.

Melbourne had no significant change over the month and still has the most online residential sales listings of all the capital cities.

Christopher says the listings are still elevated across Australia.

“However, there is now a large contrast between the readings of certain cities. Take Melbourne as an example - Despite apparent high clearance rates at auction, there is still too many listings on the market, creating headwinds for a Melbourne housing recovery,” he says.

“In contrast, Sydney is clearly experiencing a shortage of listings in the market, which is putting upward pressure on real estate prices. This is particularly the case in the inner ring where listings have fallen by approximately 25% over the past 12 months.”

Adelaide recorded the most significant monthly drop in stock, falling 4.5% over July to 17,536 properties. Year on year it fell 6.2%.

Darwin was the only capital city which recorded a monthly rise in listings, up 0.9% over June to 1,302 properties.