QLD real estate: What homebuyers need to know this spring
Spring heralds the start of the busiest time of year for property. But with market conditions changing, what will this season look like for Queensland?
It’s no secret that spring heralds the start of the busiest time of year for property.
But with market conditions having changed significantly in the past six months, what will spring 2022 look like?
The Spring Market Report is a suburb-by-suburb assessment exploring the opportunities for buyers and sellers this season from the team at PropTrack.
Whether you’re a first-home buyer, a seasoned investor or a homeowner looking for a change, knowing the current market metrics will be crucial in making informed property decisions this spring.
As we enter the selling season, the top question on the minds of buyers and sellers is property prices, which have been falling nationally.
Home prices were down in July and are now 1.7 per cent below the peak they reached in March.
Prices in Brisbane have held up a bit better, but have also fallen a little in recent months to be 0.2 per cent below their May peak.
Conditions have also eased from earlier in the year.
Nationally, we’ve seen measures of buyer demand moderate and the time taken to sell a home has started to increase.
The good news for would-be buyers this spring is that there is a bit more stock to choose from.
This year has been busy in property markets across the country, with more new listings across the first half of the year than any year since 2015.
All that new stock coming on to the market, coupled with homes taking longer to sell, means buyers have a bit more choice than was the case earlier in the year.
Even so, buyers in Brisbane are facing tough competition after a long period of strong demand for a limited number of properties.
The total stock of properties listed for sale is still down more than a quarter compared to pre-pandemic levels and remains well below decade-average levels.
And the good news for sellers? Prices in Brisbane are still up a whopping 48 per cent compared to pre-pandemic.
As well, Brisbane has been one of the fastest-growing capital cities over the Covid-19 pandemic period.
Underpinning all these changes is the fact that the Reserve Bank of Australia has already raised interest rates almost two percentage points in the past four months.
That’s making mortgage repayments more expensive for existing homeowners and has reduced how much would-be buyers can borrow.
Mortgage repayments for typical recent Brisbane buyers are up $480 a month since the RBA started raising rates in May.
That has already affected home prices and, with inflation still well above the RBA’s target, interest rates will continue to rise.
Given how quickly and how far the RBA is raising interest rates, we expect home prices nationally will likely fall another 2-5 per cent this year, and another 7-10 per cent next year.
Price falls in Brisbane will probably be a bit smaller, given the ongoing strong demand for Brisbane properties and the city’s affordability compared to Sydney and Melbourne.
The longer-run fundamentals of the housing market remain strong.
Unemployment is extremely low, wages growth is picking up, inflation should start to ease and international migration is returning.
In the near-term, there are opportunities for sellers to embrace.
Demand on realestate.com.au remains strong. Upgraders are in a good position on the back of the rapid equity growth we saw over the pandemic, investors are being lured back by rising rents and first-home buyers remain active.