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Victorian real estate has biggest ever summer of sales as records tumble

By Mo Zeitouneh

Victoria’s red hot property market has delivered the biggest ever summer of sales, with a real estate record tumbling almost every day.

More than 70 suburbs and towns now have a new top home price, and Melbourne’s median house sale soared to an unprecedented $1.125m, according to Real Estate Institute of Victoria data.

Experts believe while the sizzling action will cool slightly in autumn, records will continue being smashed as buyers tune out the threat of rising interest rates as “white noise”.

26 University Drive, Taylors Hill, is among the Victorian homes to break records this summer.

This week’s forecast 1670 auctions is the highest number ever scheduled for February.

It cements this summer as the busiest on record for real estate, with the possibility more than 9500 auctions will have been called by the time the final hammer comes down on Sunday.

The previous hottest summer was in 2017-2018 when 7869 auctions led to 5444 sales.

REIV figures show the state has already notched 6128 sales at auction this summer, making it the biggest summer of sales on record too.

Scott Patterson calls an auction in the heat of the summer market. Picture: Rob Leeson

Institute president Adam Docking said huge numbers of sellers and buyers sidelined during lockdowns last year had effectively forced the combination of spring and summer property markets.

The result was an incredible 81 real estate records being broken at a rate of one every 26.5 hours in the biggest summer “in real estate history”.

“I think we have broken every record that there is,” Mr Docking said.

Even the threat of rising interest rates was unlikely to stop buyers in the months ahead, though a more balanced autumn market was still likely as buyer and seller numbers became more balanced, he said.

“We might not necessarily keep breaking records, but we will have a very solid property market,” he said.

“It is unbreakable at the moment. We have people leaving the suburbs and cities to go interstate and to regional areas, and we still have records being broken.”

36 Penton Way, Lynbrook, was among the homes sold for a suburban price record.

Barry Plant executive director Mike McCarthy said regional and peri-urban areas like the Mornington and Bellarine peninsulas, Geelong and Melbourne’s outer ‘burbs had gone “gangbusters”.

“But we’re still seeing through the industry, auction clearance rates in excess of 80 per cent,” Mr McCarthy said.

“So the market is absorbing stock quite well, and in the middle to outer suburbs in particular.”

Auctioneer Paul Tzamalis, crowned the REIV senior auctioneer of the year for 2021 this week, said the booming conditions were driven by homesellers confidence in no more lockdowns.

“Everyone knows where they stand,” he said.

A hectic auction turned this 160 Hudsons Rd, Spotswood, home into the suburb’s priciest pad.

Ray White Victoria chief executive Stephen Dullens said the end of most restrictions for real estate had also made for a more manageable situation for agents compared to post-lockdown markets, when only one-on-one inspections could be held, and the firm had needed to offer its staff resilience training to cope with market conditions and workloads.

Real Estate Buyers Agents Association of Australia president Cate Bakos said records would continue to fall as Melbourne began to catch up with regional Victorian areas that outpaced the big smoke in 2021.

Ms Bakos said Victoria’s booming summer property market had been buoyed by “disproportionately stupid number of auctions in December” and a “really enormous February”.

Buyers have taken no notice of speculation around interest rate rises this year.

“The only way they will have an effect is if they actually do go up,” Ms Bakos said.

“At this point buyers and sellers just think the talk about them is white noise.

15 Osmond Cres, Wollert, set a record for the northern suburb’s housing market.

“I think we will continue to see listing activity at record levels in autumn.”

With more stock and some buyers likely to get caught up watching for property policies in the federal election expected in May, buying before back-to-back long weekends for Easter and Anzac Day would give buyers their best chance, she said.

“And with the return of internationals, winter could be a good time to sell,” Ms Bakos added.

Across the board she tipped affordable homes to be most in demand.

source: rea.com.au

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