Our continuing lockdown across Victoria has been a sobering experience that has created uncertainty, delay and stress in all our lives.
But it is essential that we remain optimistic about our future, and that has never been more relevant than for those who’d been planning to buy or sell a home in the current spring market but instead have chosen to put their life on hold.
As experienced real estate agents in your market, we understand how the current lockdown and the lengthy “road out”, as the Premier describes it, feels frustrating.
It won’t last forever, of course. The data shows the usual boom spring real estate market that we enjoy in Melbourne at this time of year will be upon with a vengeance in November.
In Melbourne, last weekend, only 28 homes went to auction – a dramatic drop from 765 during the corresponding period last year. These CoreLogic figures are purely a reflection of the uncertainty of our extended lockdown, nothing else.
Buyers and sellers are still out there, waiting for an environment in which they feel comfortable to transact. Website realestate.com claims “serious” buyer action on their site is up 1.8 per cent compared with last year.
In contrast to Melbourne, the auction volume in Sydney for a recent weekend was 625 compared with the previous year’s 528, and the city achieved a clearance rate of almost 70%.
So, when Melbourne comes back, we’ll all hear the boom.
If you want to buy or put your home on the market once we’re out of lockdown, you need to be prepared. Competition for buyer attention will be intense, and your home will need to be in pristine condition.
For buyers, make sure you have your finances ready to go. There’s nothing more frustrating than finding your dream home and then seeing it snatched away because someone made a successful offer before you could react.
In my role as an agent in your area, we’ve been at the side of many sellers and buyers during the initial lockdown and the second wave. If you’d like to discuss how the market might trend, and what it might mean for you and the value of your property, please give us a call. As they say, “we’re all in this together”
And we’re going to get out of it together, too.