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Real Estate News
Home loan rates offered for under 2%
Loans.com.au are making a big play, offering introductory home loan rates of 1.99 per cent, which are touted as the lowest variable rate in Australia. They are also offering a two-year discounted variable rate of 2.09 per cent. These rates are available to “new customers who apply for an owner-occupier loan paying principal and interest repayments” with a 20 per…
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Real Estate News
RBA declare pandemic downturn worst since the Great Depression
The Reserve Bank of Australia is optimistic about the future of the economy, despite conceding the pandemic downturn was the “worst contraction since the Great Depression”. “Consumer spending in May and June had been stronger than expected and had also held up better than in most other countries,” the RBA said, in minutes released from the monthly monetary policy meeting.…
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Elite Agent
REIQ survey finds only 6% of renters qualified as “COVID-19 impacted”
A recent survey conducted by REIQ shows how Queensland propety managers have gone above and beyond when it comes to rent negotiations, often acting outside the Residential Tenancies and Rooming Accommodation (COVID-19 Emergency Response) Regulation 2020. A survey of over 1200 REIQ property management agencies revealed that only 6.05 per cent of rental tenants in the residential sphere qualified as…
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Elite Agent
Mall in Melbourne CBD to sell for half its 2016 price
In 2016, it was billed as “Melbourne’s newest premier fashion destination”, a re-branded inner-city mall that had just undergone a major $30m facelift, but now St Collins Lane is being sold for less than half of what JP Morgan paid for it just four years earlier. The Australian Financial Review reports that a “local fund manager backed by offshore capital”…
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Real Estate News
Jon Bon Jovi flips $20m mansion, buys $43m estate a few blocks away
After a four-decade career, 130 million album sales, and tours to over 34 million people worldwide, it’s safe to say that Jon Bon Jovi isn’t living on a prayer anymore. He is also quite the house flipper. In one single day last week, he sold a Palm Beach pad he and his wife had renovated only a few months ago…
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Elite Agent
Commercial real estate investment down 32% in Asia Pacific
JLL have delivered some not-so-surprising news: Commercial real estate investment across Asia Pacific fell by 32 per cent in the first half of 2020. Investments were down 26 per cent during the first quarter, rising to 39 per cent in the second quarter, as travel bans, economic hardship, and lockdowns impacted the real estate market. Singapore was the hardest hit…
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Elite Agent
Shopping mall windfall kicks against COVID trends
Two Sydney shopping centres have been bundled up and sold for $91.5 million, a price in step with valuations made in a pre-COVID market. This is despite shopping mall vacancies hitting a 20-year high in May. The Pemulwuy Marketplace and West Ryde Marketplace were taken to market by the Charter Hall Retail Partnership No.1 Trust. “Both centres represented an opportunity…
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Elite Agent
Pets, provisions, periodic leases: the proposed changes to WA Residential Tenancies Act
Ahead of an upcoming review of the WA Residential Tenancies Act, REIWA has released a list of policy options they hope will “help reinvigorate the rental market”. While they state that few aspects of the current rental legislation require “a complete overhaul” and that it is “generally working well,” they have outlined the below seven key policy options: Maintain the…
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Elite Agent
JobSeeker cuts likely to cause real estate crisis
The removal of the current JobSeeker supplement will result in 242,000 renters and 246,000 mortgage holders suddenly living in poverty. Those are some of the grim findings from The Australia Institute’s new report, which tips that Thursday’s announcement could place untenable pressure on the housing market. The report, led by TAI’s senior economist Matt Grudnoff, estimates 650,000 Australians, including 120,000…
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Elite Agent
Key-free locks are the new real estate must-have
Earlier this month, we wrote about the first office block in Australia to incorporate completely hands-free entry. While the developers on that high-rise had the somewhat prescient technology in the pipeline well before COVID-19 caused us all to think differently about public space, a start-up in Los Angeles is finding their hands-free offering is suddenly a hot commodity. Openpath just…
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Elite Agent
Return to print is a sign of confidence in the real estate sector
News Corp Australia will resume printing of three community papers in lucrative Sydney real estate markets this week. The Wentworth Courier, The Mosman Daily and North Shore Times will return. Not coincidentally, these papers were among the few community print titles to be spared from News Corp recent cull, where 76 papers moved to digital-only. These three papers reach 85…
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Elite Agent
Crown looking to build billion dollar retail portfolio
Since launching in Sydney in 1996, Crown Group has built a $5 billion development pipeline across Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and Los Angeles, that includes residential communities, luxury apartments, hotels, a fund management platform, and shopping centres. It’s the latter of those interests they are looking to further develop, announcing a long-term plan to develop a $1 billion portfolio of retail…
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Real Estate News
The best suburbs for auctions
CoreLogic’s recent auction data for the June quarter showed that both the number of auctions and the clearance rate dropped significantly. But certain suburbs performed much better than others. In Sydney, the highest performing suburb was Cremorne, with 23 of 30 properties under the hammer selling, a 76.7 per cent clearance rate. Other hot areas in Sydney included Leichhardt with…
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Real Estate News
Fine print may dash numerous HomeBuilder hopes
Australians with plans to pull their super and use it as part of a deposit for a HomeBuilder claim may run into some pesky fine print that sets their plans back considerably. Real Estate Buyers Agents Association (REBAA) president Cate Bakos warns of a little-known rule that banks are beholden to when lending money: a rule that may completely throw…
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Elite Agent
$116m land package to benefit regional WA
A new package aimed at stimulating real estate investment in regional Western Australia will be rolled out over the next few weeks. The McGowan government announced the $116 million Regional Land Booster package with the goal of “boosting the economy, creating regional jobs and assisting regional businesses to recover from the impacts of COVID-19”. “The Regional Land Booster package will…
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Elite Agent
Confidence within the property industry is on the rise
The easing of COVID restrictions over the last few months has resulted in a surge of confidence in the property industry since April. The latest ANZ/Property Council survey took place between June 15 and July 1, surveying 955 industry folk. Not surprisingly, the states and territories with the biggest shift in sentiment were those least impacted by COVID-19: South Australia,…
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Elite Agent
New homes under construction dipped well before COVID-19
New research from HIA shows that the low numbers of new houses under construction was a major issue well before the fiscal and physical pressures associated with COVID-19. At the end of March, as the first restrictions started to come into play, there were around 188,000 new homes under construction. This was the lowest number since 2015. While the figures…
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Elite Agent
$83m ‘Planning Reform’ will cut a lot of red tape
The NSW Government’s newly-announced $83m plan to remove swathes of red tape currently wrapped around the planning system is being celebrated as a huge win by Property Council NSW. They predict the NSW Planning Reform Action Plan will “speed up the planning system, create jobs and support the economic recovery” of the state. The Action Plan will streamline many processes…
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Elite Agent
Miranda Kerr bought a historical Hunter Valley vineyard
Miranda Kerr has been revealed as the mystery buyer of QT Hotels’ $7.5m Loggerheads Estate in the NSW Hunter Valley. The 215-acre property sold for the full asking price, having last sold in 2016 to QT Hotels for $6m. The property boasts the vineyard, which spans for 10 acres, a fully-licensed cellar door wine sales outlet, a seven-bedroom residence, plus…
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Real Estate News
Darwin expecting a real estate surge after borders reopen
As Northern Territory’s borders reopen on Friday to most of the country, real estate agents are expecting buyers, renters, and holidaymakers to flood the capital city. Darwin is hot right now – and not just on the thermostat. The rental vacancy rate sits at 1.8 per cent, the lowest it’s been for seven years. In addition, the value of housing…
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Real Estate News
Surprise drop in national residential property listings
National residential property listings dropped by 1 per cent from May to June, according to new figures from SQM Research. Listings are also down 7.5 per cent from last June. There were just shy of three thousand fewer properties listed in June, with listings down from 304,137 in May to 301,140. Perth and Melbourne were the only capital cities to…
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Real Estate News
Rental vacancy rates dropped nationally in June
More rental properties are being filled, with the national residential rental vacancy rate decreasing to 2.2 per cent throughout June, according to SQM Research. In May, 2.5 per cent of properties were vacant, with the vacancy rate this time last year sitting at 2.3 per cent. As of June 30, there were 77,132 vacant residential properties across the Australia. In…
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Real Estate News
New home sales rose in June, thanks to HomeBuilder
New home sales have risen by 77.6 per cent in June, up from a record low in May. “(This is) off the back of the Government’s HomeBuilder program announced at the beginning of the month,” Housing Industry Association’s Chief Economist Tim Reardon explains. “Without intervention, a significant contraction in the volume of work on the ground would have occurred in…
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Elite Agent
Next Friday is National Property Manager’s Day
Property managers around Australia: you have little over a week to start heavily hinting to your boss about next Friday’s breakfast cake, banquet luncheon, and a mid-afternoon knock-off. That’s because the inaugural National Property Manager’s Day is happening on Friday, July 24. The initiative was dreamed up by the REINSW, with all other state and territory Real Estate Institutes eagerly…
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Elite Agent
Auction action drops in June quarter
The June quarter saw both auction volumes and the clearance rate drop as many sectors of Australian business were severely impacted by COVID-19, the latest CoreLogic data reveals. Social distancing measures were increased immediately prior to the June quarter, including a ban on all on-site auctions and inspections. Coupled with the economic crisis, many property owners withdrew their homes from…
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Elite Agent
More of Sydney’s CBD to go pedestrian-only from next week
The City of Sydney has fast-tracked plans to turn more of George Street into a pedestrian-only boulevard, a move that will substantially change the heart of Australia’s largest city. From Monday, the following changes will be made to the city. The extension of the existing southbound lane closure of George Street between Bathurst and Campbell streets to Rawson PlaceClosure of…
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Elite Agent
Record number of home loans refinanced in May
Both the total number and total value of refinanced home loans hit a new high in May. Finder analysis of recent ABS data reveals 33,712 Aussies refinanced their home loan in May, to the tune of $15.1 billion. These figures were up $12 billion from April – the previous record. Almost two third (64 per cent) of May’s refinanced loans…
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Real Estate News
Openn Negotiation hits $1b in property sales
Openn Negotiation, the online sales platform, has just celebrated $1 billion in property sales, since its April 2017 launch. The platform combines aspects of auction, expressions of interest, private treaty and end date sales into a one stop shop for realtors. Peter Gibbons, Managing Director of Openn Negotiation, said, “We’ve worked really hard developing and evolving our platform with some…
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Real Estate News
New home loan data may suggest a slight recovery
Data released last Thursday by the ABS showed the value of new loan commitments across Australia fell by 11.6 per cent over May, representing the largest single monthly drop on record. Despite the May figure sitting $2 billion below the average lending level of the past decade, CoreLogic’s data suggests June results may indicate a recovery.As Eliza Owen, Head of…
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Real Estate News
Leanne Druery joins RE/MAX Results team
Top Mackay real estate agent and Transform 2017 winner, Leanne Druery, has joined the RE/MAX Results team, bringing her award-winning talents to the global brand. Over the past seven years, Ms Druery has embedded herself into the tight-knit Mackay community, a situation that isn’t set to change with her shift to RE/MAX. “I’m still the same local resident who is…
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Elite Agent
LeBron James treats himself to a $56m Beverly Hills mansion
Since signing a four-year, A$221m deal with the L.A. Lakers in mid-2018, NBA superstar LeBron James has splashed out on three mansions in the city. His latest purchase is his most lavish yet, – a $56 million Beverly Hills pile, formerly owned by Lee Phillip Bell, creator of The Young and the Restless, and The Bold and the Beautiful, among…
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Real Estate News
Mount Panorama property surrounded by iconic race track hits the market
Imagine being able to tell people your residential address is 489 Conrad Straight, Mount Panorama. The petrol-head’s dream property has just come onto the market: 17 acres surrounded by the world-famous Mount Panorama Circuit, home to the Bathurst 1000. Despite its treacherous turns and high-octane reputation as one of the hardest tracks on earth to traverse, the Mount Panorama Circuit…
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Elite Agent
Shopping mall vacancies hit 20-year high
It’s not looking good for the future of the humble shopping mall, as coronavirus hastens the closure of stores inside centres around the country. New figures from JLL show the national vacancy rate in shopping malls rose to an average of 5.1 per cent in June, after sitting at 3.8 per cent just six months earlier. In CBD shopping malls,…
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Elite Agent
87.7% of homes sold for profit in March quarter
Less than 13 per cent of houses resold at a loss during the first quarter of 2020, despite floods, bushfires and COVID-19. New figures from CoreLogic analysed approximately 72,500 sales over the first three months of the year. It shows profit-making sales in March were only down 1 per cent from the December quarter, a nominal amount. Gross profit was…
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Real Estate News
NZ Government unveils huge emissions shake-up for building sector
The New Zealand Government has unveiled an impressive new program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the building and construction sector. The industry currently produces 20 per cent of New Zealand’s total emissions, through the production of building materials, construction itself, and the energy used in the buildings. They have a goal to reach net zero emissions by 2050. The…
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