Investors stepping back

Property investors have backed away from the housing market since the Government’s housing announcement in March, the latest Real Estate Institute/Tony Alexander survey suggests. Sixtythree per cent of the real estate agents surveyed reported seeing fewer investors in April. This continued the decline recorded in the March survey, which was carried out after the Government’s announcement of tougher rules for investors. In that survey, a net 41 per cent of agents said they were seeing fewer investors. A downward trend in investor presence has been apparent in the surveys since the start of December. The Real Estate Institute and Alexander said the Government was achieving its intention of dampening investor demand for existing property, but also causing a reduction in the interest of first-home buyers. A net 8 per cent of agents reported seeing fewer first-home buyers in the market in April. A reading of zero would indicate responses were evenly split. It was the lowest result since the survey started last May and well down on the net 64 per cent of agents who reported seeing more first-home buyers in November. Previous house price cycles showed that when predictions of continued strong price gains gave way to talk of prices flattening or falling, young buyers pulled back, the institute and Alexander said. Only 30 per cent of agents reported that prices were rising.