Housing supply crisis worsens

The Australian property market is currently recording about 4.1 months of effective housing supply, new data has found.

According to RP Data's latest research, Australia is currently in the midst of a terrible housing shortage, with Melbourne the worst sufferer.

RP Data's research analyst Cameron Kusher found Melbourne has the lowest current effective supply at 2.8 months, while Perth and Brisbane have the greatest effective supply recorded at 9.0 and 5.9 months respectively.

The Perth results indicate that this market remains consistent and has recorded the greatest effective supply amongst all of the capital cities since the beginning of 2007.

According to Mr Kusher, the Perth market has been recording a poor market performance for much of the period following the significant surge in property values recorded in the city between 2005 and 2007.

He said that since that time, sales volumes have become sluggish and clearly, a significant volume of properties have been available for sale which has resulted in an elevated level of effective supply.

The soft market conditions within the city are reflected by the fact that on average there was 7.6 months of effective supply in the Perth market - property values increased by 4.4 per cent since the beginning of 2007.

"Melbourne on the other hand has the lowest effective supply amongst major capital cities (2.8 months) and recorded one of the strongest levels of growth in values between the start of 2007 and August 2010 increasing by a total of 51.2 per cent; the strong market conditions over this timeframe have resulted in increasing demand for properties and as a result, those listed for sale have been being rapidly consumed by the market," Mr Kusher said.

Credit:Rebonline

RP Data Property Pulse Release

Total property sales in Australia to July 2010 amount to $213 billion

Curious about just how much property has been sold in dollar terms in Australia over the past 12months?  In the rpdata.com weekly Property Pulse released today, analyst Cameron Kusher analyses those suburbs which have had the greatest total value in sales.  Surprisingly, it’s not the premium markets that are recording the highest gross value of home sales as one might expect.

Today’s results show that the total value of dwelling sales across the country was an impressive $213 billion for the year to July 2010.  As a comparative benchmark - just five years ago the total value of sales across the country equated to more than $165.5 billion – this equates to healthful increase of 30 per cent.

Across the country, the suburb to record the greatest total value of sales during the year was Sydney’s Mosman which now holds a median price of $2.1 million.  Mosman had 329 house sales during the last year which accounted to almost $851 million worth of property transactions - less than 0.5 per cent of the total value of property transacted during the last 12 months. 

Assuming an average agents commission of 2.5 per cent, this equates to almost $21.3 million worth of commission within the suburb. 

When conducting today’s national sales analysis,  Mr Kusher said it was interesting to see a trend across those suburbs that have recorded the greatest total value of sales for houses; only one of the top five performers in each state has recorded a fall in median price over the last 12 months and that was Mosman Park in Perth.

Credit:Mitch Koper Download PDF file for the full report of this media release here.