Home to greatest bargains

BUYERS looking to secure a bargain should look no further than Townsville, with sellers offering the biggest vendor discounts in Australia’s regional markets.

Corelogic’s latest quarterly regional review, which analysed 25 of Australia’s largest non-capital city markets, found that Townsville sellers were, on average, offering a discount rate of 5.9 per cent to secure a sale on their house.

But buyers should act fast, with that vendor discount rate falling from 7 per cent a year ago.

Townsville houses are also selling faster, down from a median of 62 days on the market a year ago to 55 days today.

It is a similar story for units, with vendor discounting falling from 6.9 per cent to 6.2 per cent and days on the market down from 70 days to 62.

As a result, the number of houses and units changing hands is up 9.7 per cent on a year ago and 1.5 per cent on the five-year average.

This has resulted in the median sales price for both houses and units gaining ground.

It is a similar story in Cairns, where vendor discounting has dropped 0.7 per cent to 4.3 per cent for houses and 0.6 per cent to 4.7 per cent for units.

However, the time on market for units has increased from 59 days to 72 days, likely the result of the brakes being applied to the tourism sector due to COVID-19.

Time on the market for houses remained unchanged at 58 days, Corelogic said.

Vendor discounting and time on the market also decreased in the resource-rich Mackay-isaac-whitsunday region, which has seen a resurgence in the mining sector.

Corelogic head of research Tim Lawless said that regional housing values, broadly speaking, had so far held up better during the pandemic than their capital city counterparts.

He said dwelling values across the combined regional areas of Australia had slipped by just 0.1 per cent between March and the end of July, while capital city home values were down 2 per cent over the same period.

“While the region by region data shows diversity, the relatively steady conditions across the regional markets of Australia can probably be attributed to factors such as less impact on housing demand from stalling overseas migration,” he said.

“Also, there likely remains some momentum in the trend towards rising demand for lifestyle properties that was prevalent prior to COVID-19.”

Mr Lawless said that regional areas offered up a variety of advantages and risks.

“On the positive side, housing prices tend to be lower, providing a more affordable entry point to the market; population densities are generally lower, which is something that might be even more appealing as we move through this pandemic; and in many examples, regional areas will offer some lifestyle advantages, either via the location’s proximity to the coastline or wide open spaces,” he said.

“On the downside, regional economic conditions can be more volatile, especially those areas that are heavily dependent on a single industry ... and some areas may not show the same level of amenity and access to essential services as a capital city or major centre.”