The housing market figures for the period covering the September quarter released today by the Bureau of Statistics Residential Property Price Index (RPPI) may not reflect the most recent trends in the housing market, but it reflects what is being said about the property market in the recent months, that is the property market is cooling down.
According to ABC, the said figures show that indeed home prices have become stronger with its 2 percent increase on average seen in the eight big cities. However it is only less than half the increase in home prices in the quarter before that. In the report, Sydney and Melbourne as showing to be ahead of the rest in terms of price growth, but both cities are said to have slowed down in such that Sydney has growth is down to 3.1 per cent from 8.9 percent, while Melbourne has dipped from 4.2 to 2.9 percent.
Another report, monthly Core Logic RP Data, reflects the fact that home values in both Sydney and Melbourne have plunged in last month by 1.4 and 3.5 percent.
According to ABC, aside from reports showing that the market is cooling off, there is data indicating that rental vacancies have risen to startling levels. For example in Melbourne, there is said to be an increase of 3.4 percent in rental prices for houses and 3 percent for units. The same is true in Hobart when aside from that, landlords tend to ask 8 percent more for rental homes.
Meanwhile, rental prices in Sydney were steadily rising at less than 2 percent over the past 12 months as asking prices seem to plunge.
"We note that 2015 overall has recorded another year of modestly rising vacancies," ABC quotes SQM's managing director Louis Christopher. "It suggests the supply side has been running a touch ahead of underlying demand at the national level. As we predicted back in October, I believe rents in 2016 will record only modest rises with the outperforming areas likely to be the Gold Coast and Hobart."
