- 2,876 properties were taken to auction last week (+37%)
- Preliminary clearance data shows 80.4% were sold (+1.9% points)
- A year ago, amid national lockdowns, only 612 were held, less than half sold
Is the property market running out of steam? Not according to last week’s preliminary auction data, across the capital cities, as collected by CoreLogic.
With a 37% increase in the number of auctions as compared to the week earlier (which had ended with the ANZAC Day long weekend and a snap lockdown 3-day in Perth), 2,876 properties were put under the hammer.
Preliminary data from CoreLogic suggests the clearance rate is back above 80%, with 80.4% selling at or prior to the auction.
The equivalent rate the week before had slipped below 80% to 78.5% on lower volumes (2,087 auctions).
This is all in stark contrast to a year ago, when, amid the pandemic lockdowns, only 612 auctions were held nationwide, with less than half of them selling. What a difference a year makes.
This is why we need to take much longer views of the property market than a single week, or a single month. Long term trends are what people should be looking out for, and what the auction data is telling us is that demand for properties, at whatever prices they sell at under the hammer, is not abating. Clearance rates have been above 80% for most of 2021 so far.
Despite recent CoreLogic data that may tell us the property market’s rise may be slowing a little (up 1.8% in April as opposed to 2.8% the month before), there’s still plenty of steam left in the auction market, it would seem.
Moreover, over in Perth, a median price level was passed in April not seen in three years. After six years of downturn, the Perth market probably has room to rise some more.
Capital city’s auction statistics (Preliminary)
The combined capital cities clearance rate for the past week was 80.4% (82.8% for houses, 72.8% for units).
Of the total 2,876 auctions held, 356 were passed in (12.3%) and 121 were withdrawn (4.2%) according to CoreLogic. The median selling price was $1,086,000.
