MILDURA houses in the market’s middle range are still in high demand, despite the nation-wide return to “normality”.
Ray White managing director and sales agent Damian Portaro said houses around $500,000 were currently attracting the most demand locally.
“Between that $400,000 to $600,000 price point, that seems to be absolutely flying very, very fast,” he said.
“The other markets, the sub $300,000 and the plus $700,000 for example, they are okay, they are just back to normality but, for some reason, that nice modern home that’s still slightly affordable, might be anywhere from one to eight years old, is really, really popular and moving well.”
Mr Portaro said many houses within that price bracket were exceeding asking price.
“I just had a property go 35 grand above top of the range, so it was probably 50 grand above the owner’s asking,” he said.
“Whereas the other price ranges take a little bit longer and take a bit more effort, and with only like one buyer.
“In that particular example, I ended up with eight offers on that property in the first four days.”
Mr Portaro said he wasn’t sure exactly what was causing the trend, but thought there could be a few possible reasons.
“There might be a bit of a shortage of them or it could be because the higher end of the market, the $800,000, $900,000 or $1 million, interest rates could heavily affect them,” he said.
“The sub $300,000 market is quite like an investor market, so they could be sitting back, but the $400,000 to $600,000 market, it could be your second home, you want something a bit nicer and that seems to be unbelievably popular.”
The Reserve Bank further increased the cash rate to 2.35 per cent this month.
According to Finder.com.au, the average mortgage holder was now paying 29 per cent more than they were in April, and one-in-four homeowners was struggling to pay their mortgage in August.
The rate rises have been followed by a decline in national home values, which CoreLogic stated were 3.5 per cent down from their peak in April.
When house prices began to drop across the country in July, director of Collie & Tierney First National Ben Ridley said he had not seen a decrease in Mildura.
“We are certainly not seeing much discounting going on,” he told the Sunraysia Daily.
“We have found that prices have stayed relatively stable to the fact that there is quite a limited amount of stock.”
Market insight service PropTrack’s July Home Price Index report states that Australia had recorded a house price decrease of 0.43 per cent for the month of July.
The August Home Price Index report stated Australian home prices fell again, down 0.39 per cent.
The report stated, however, that despite heavy price decreases in regional Australia, down 0.34 per cent in August, prices were still significantly above their pre-pandemic levels.
The Domain House Price report stated that Mildura’s media house price was $403,750 in June, $53,750 more than it was 12 months prior and $138,750 more than it was in June. 2017.
Mildura recorded an annual change of 15.4 per cent and a five yearly change of 52.4 per cent.
Last month, the average house sale price was $436,021, with 82 properties sold.
Mr Portaro said the Mildura market was still consistent at present, with buyer numbers starting to increase.
“We actually found that buyer numbers are now picking up particularly,” he said.
“Our open homes are now up and it might only be one or two more groups per open, but one or two more groups per open is 25 to 35 per cent more buyers potentially. So it is good.”
Mr Portaro said there was still a lot of uncertainty in the market as interest rates continued to rise, but he hoped the current demand was a good sign for Mildura’s market future.
“We are finding there is uncertainty, towards the end of the month it feels like the market begins to calm and settle and then (the RBA) make another change and there is a bit more turmoil straight away,” he said.
“I’m hoping (the $400,000 to $600,000 housing demand) is a good sign for the rest that everything will normalise at a slightly better level.”
