Canberra market down ahead of holiday break

The Canberra home auction market faded at the weekend with seller activity set to ease over coming weeks due to holiday distractions.

Canberra recorded a clearance rate of 64.9 percent on Saturday which was well down on the 71.4 per cent reported the previous weekend and also slightly lower than the 66.0 per cent recorded over the same Saturday last year.

The weekend result was the lowest recorded by the local market for over three months and well below this year’s average weekend clearance rate average of 71.2 per cent

65 homes were listed for auction on the weekend in Canberra which was higher than the 57 auctioned the previous weekend and the 56 listed over the same weekend last year. Reflecting the commencement of school holidays and the Labour Day long weekend, auction numbers will be well down next Saturday with 35 homes set to go under the hammer.

Weston Creek reported the highest regional clearance rate at the weekend with a 100 per cent result from the single reported auction followed by Belconnen with 80.0 per cent, Woden Valley  75.0 per cent, Tuggeranong 64.3 per cent  and Canberra Central with a  clearance rate of 40.0 per cent. No auction results were reported for Gungahlin at the weekend.

Notable sales reported at the weekend included a  4  bedroom home at 4 Higgs  Place Hughes sold for  $1,440,000 by Peter Blackshaw Real Estate, another  4  bedroom home at 10 Rooney  Place Isaacs sold by One Agency Don McPherson for  $1,175,000, a  5  bedroom home at 29 Goulburn  Place Macquarie sold for  $1,091,500 by Ray White Canberra, a  4  bedroom home at 13 Wilsmore  Crescent Chifley sold for  $1,085,000 by Peter Blackshaw Real Estate and a  3  bedroom unit at 80/18 Austin  Street Griffith sold by Luton Properties – Manuka for  $1,055,000.

The most expensive property reported sold at auction was a  4  bedroom home at 18 Goble  Street Hughes sold for  $1,665,000 by Peter Blackshaw Real Estate. The most affordable property reported sold at the weekend was a  2  bedroom home at 19 Goddard  Crescent Holt sold for  $290,000 by One Agency Michael Potter.

For a list of Canberra auction results click here Canberra auction results September 23.

Canberra recorded a median auction price of $700,000 on Saturday which was lower than the $787,000 reported over the previous weekend and 1.6 per cent lower than the $711,000 recorded over the same weekend last year. A total of $23.9m was reported sold at auction in Canberra at the weekend.

Residential investor activity has declined sharply in Canberra as recently tighter lending conditions have clearly impacted most housing markets.

Latest data from the ABS reported that the ACT approved residential investor loans to the value of $172.5m over July which was a dramatic decline of 20.0 per cent compared to the previous month’s total. July’s ACT total was also 10.4 per cent lower than that recorded by the local market over July last year.

Although investor lending in the ACT fell steeply over July, loans to this group to the value of $1.3bn were approved over the first seven months of this year which is a solid increase of 14.5 per cent compared to the same period last year.

Nearly all states recorded sharp declines in loans to residential investors over July clearly reflecting the impact of restrictive lending practices recently introduced by banks as a response to policy initiatives by APRA the financial regulator.

Dr Andrew Wilson is Domain Group Chief Economist Twitter@DocAndrewWilson join on LinkedIn and Facebook at MyHousingMarket.