Melbourne market resumes after pause with seller confidence soaring

The Melbourne home auction market resumes at the gallop this Saturday following last weekend’s pause in activity due to the grand final and school holiday distractions. 

More than 950 homes are scheduled to go under the hammer this weekend which will be significantly higher than last Saturday’s 51 but, in line with the spring trend so far, will again be well below the 1250 auctioned over the same weekend last year. 

Melbourne’s west is the most popular region for auctions this weekend with 194, followed by the outer east with 135, the north east 127, the inner south 121, the inner city 103, the inner east 91, the north 83 and the south east with 71 auctions scheduled on Saturday.

Reservoir is the most popular auction suburb in Melbourne this Saturday with 17, followed by Mount Waverley and Glen Waverley each with 15, South Yarra 13 and St Albans, East Bentleigh and Preston each hosting 12 auctions on Saturday.

The Melbourne home auction market went into significant pause mode last Saturday with buyers and sellers distracted by the seemingly irresistible lure of the AFL grand final.

The handful of auctions that were conducted, nonetheless, produced a strong clearance rate and provided another measure of the strength of the early spring market.

Last Saturday’s 87.1 per cent result was higher than the 79.6 per cent recorded the previous weekend and significantly higher than the 56 per cent reported over the same grand final weekend last year.

Regional results reflected the weekend’s small auction numbers with the north east, north, west and inner city all recording 100 per cent clearance rates from a handful of listings.

This week the Reserve Bank announced the direction of official interest rates over October with no surprise that rates will to remain on hold at the record low 1.5 per cent. 

The RBA will be awaiting Australian Bureau of Statistics inflation data for the September quarter to be released on October 26 but will also be increasingly wary about strengthening housing markets particularly in Melbourne and Sydney. 

Rising auction activity is predictably translating into surging price growth with the Domain Group asking price index for Melbourne houses increasing by 1.4 per cent over the September quarter for an annual increase of 10.3 per cent. Sydney houses recorded the highest capital city asking price growth rate over the quarter – up by 2 per cent and an annual increase of 4.4 per cent.

Dr Andrew Wilson is Domain Group’s chief economist

Twitter @DocAndrewWilson