Rising house prices encourage a rush of home owners to list their properties for sale in autumn

Home-owners are rushing to sell their properties this autumn, encouraged by the rising market around the country and recent sales for eye-popping prices.

But the spate of new listings has barely affected the fierce buyer demand, according to industry stalwarts.

Most capital cities have recorded an increase in listings over the four weeks to May 2, from the previous four weeks, Domain data shows, with Canberra recording the biggest rise of 64.3 per cent.

The majority of that was led by unit listings, which exploded by 132.2 per cent in that time, whereas house listings rose by 35 per cent in the same period.

It comes as Canberra recorded the biggest quarterly jump in median capital-city house prices, rising 9.7 per cent to $927,577 – an all-time high.

The ACT was not alone, as more sellers in almost every corner of Australia have come to market in recent weeks because of record-breaking prices in almost every capital city in the first quarter of this year, according to Domain senior research analyst Nicola Powell.

“What the new listings will help to do is ease the rapid rate of price gains. It will help alleviate the tough conditions that buyers have been transacting under,” Dr Powell said. “We’ve seen such phenomenal and rare conditions of the first three months of this year on a number of fronts.

“It gets to that point where sellers are encouraged to market.”

Sydney had the next-highest jump in property listings, lifting 22.2 per cent over the month.

There was a 30.3 per cent increase in house listings compared to a 13.5 per cent rise in unit listings.

But this increase was “still not enough”, according to Michelle May, founder of Michelle May Buyers Agents, who said the buyer pool was very deep in Sydney.

“Instead of having 20 people registered, you still have 15 or 10 people registered. Ninety per cent miss out and move onto the next property,” Ms May said.

“I’m hearing that some buyers are throwing verbal offers without doing any kind of due diligence, offering on multiple properties and hoping something sticks.”

This has left the harbour city seeing some of the fiercest competition, with double-digit registrations and reserves being smashed by more than $1 million becoming a regular occurrence.

“Any extra listing is helpful because it does give people more choice but it is not significant enough to really halt the sharp rise in prices,” Ms May said.

She added that while more properties were coming to market, many were sub-par, leaving buyers with not much to choose from in the end.

In Melbourne, overall listings increased 12.9 per cent in the same period.

That was led by house listings, which jumped 15.5 per cent in the past month while unit listings rose 13.4 per cent.

This was beginning to level the market out in Victoria, according to Barry Plant Group chief executive Mike McCarthy.

“I’m getting a sense we are seeing just a little bit less heat in the market. It’s still very, very strong,” Mr McCarthy said. “It’s gone from white-hot to red-hot.

“The number of appraisals we’re seeing at the moment would indicate we would see a slight increase in listings, which I’m not concerned about. It puts us back into a balanced market.”

Brisbane property listings lifted 7.9 per cent, with the majority of that from houses. There was a decline in unit listings.

But that does not concern Mitch Peereboom, chief auctioneer of Ray White Queensland, who said there were enough buyers to keep up the momentum in the market.

“We’ve got enough buyer demand … to still see multiple bidders,” he said. “A 10 per cent increase won’t calm down what we’re seeing.

“There are so many buyers we can’t actually find properties for them. This is exactly what we wanted.”