Monthly Property News 4th Edition 2024.

“Population keeps growing”

Hi everyone, I’m Jason Mudford from OBrien Corporate with the fourth edition of the property news for 2024.

Nationally, the median home index for March rose by 0.6 percent, according to our source, CoreLogic, which is the second consecutive month we have had a 0.6 percent increase. Nationally, home prices have now had 14 straight months of growth, but for Melbournians, we would be feeling quite different about the state of the market. Melbourne had no change in median home prices for March and has fallen 0.2 percent for the first quarter of the year, the only capital city to record negative growth. Over a rolling 12 months, Melbourne has had 3.2% growth, as opposed to other major capital cities recording large gains: Brisbane 15.9%, Perth 19.8%, Sydney 9.6%, Adelaide 13.3%.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed its population report on 21 March for Australia and its states and territories and the population growth nationally to 30 September 2023, grew by 2.5% or 659,800 people. Victoria recorded the largest increase with 192,700 net, taking our state to just over 6,865,000 people, with NSW still the largest state with over 8,394,000.

To meet the migration demand, Australia needs to build 240,000 homes a year, but currently we are building about 170,000. The ABS also released building approvals in March, and approvals for private sector houses fell in all states across Australia, with Victoria recording a 16.7% drop.

In other economic news, economists expected Australia’s unemployment rate to tick lower to 4.0% in February; however, a massive 116,000 jobs were created, and unemployment dropped back to 3.7%. Annual inflation was unchanged in February and has now been 3.4 percent for three consecutive months, which is exactly what the Reserve Bank has been wanting.

Rental yield in Melbourne has grown significantly from 2.76% two years ago to 3.57% in March 2024, to now be our highest yield since March 2015. This gives reasons for investors to come into the market, and investor finance activity is up 18.5% over the past 12 months to January 2024.

That’s all for this month. Remember,  the information provided is of a general nature; you should always seek independent legal, financial, taxation or other advice in relation to your unique circumstances.

Check out our website for:
Scheduled Auctions
This Week’s Opens
Our Suburb Reports