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The property market will likely have a very soft landing in 2022 if there is no sharp rise in listings in February, a research firm has predicted.
SQM’s research director Louis Christopher reported a notable increase in auction activity for December 2021, despite total listings declining on a month-by-month and a year-by-year comparison.
According to figures revealed by SQM Research, national residential property listings declined by 6.5 per cent in December 2021, from 233,716 in November 2021 to 218,415 in December 2021.
Month-by-month, the sharpest decline was recorded in Canberra (15.9 per cent), closely followed by Sydney (15.8 per cent) and Melbourne (12.9 per cent).
Property listings numbers have been falling downwards across the country over the last year. National listings plummeted 20 per cent compared to a year ago, with the largest drop recorded in Brisbane (-34.4 per cent). Right behind are Adelaide (-28.1 per cent), Canberra (-25.4 per cent), and Hobart (-24.4 per cent).
Furthermore, new listings (less than 30 days) declined 29.5 per cent to 67,972 homes on the market in December 2021, despite a 2.4 per cent year-over-year increase. Sydney saw the largest drop in new listings, dropping 47.4 per cent.
In contrast, new listings increased the most in Darwin by 26.2 per cent over the year, followed by Sydney and Perth, which increased by 17.6 per cent and 15.5 per cent, respectively.
In December 2021, days on market fell by 6.8 per cent, and they are down by a massive 49.5 per cent year over year, showing that older stock, or listings over 180 days old, is being sold.
“Overall, there remains a shortage of listings at the national level. As a result, vendors are in no panic at this point. Indeed, they lifted their asking prices for the month,” stated Mr Christopher.
Looking at property asking prices, Canberra had the sharpest increase for houses, which rose at 8.4 per cent and 5 per cent for units in the 30 days leading up to 4 January 2022.
Adelaide houses rose by 4.3 per cent but fell by 0.5 per cent for units. Brisbane recorded an increase for both houses (4.2 per cent) and for units (2.6 per cent).
Like Adelaide, Melbourne experienced an increase for houses (3 per cent) but fell by 1 per cent for units.
Similar to Brisbane, Perth and Sydney saw both an increase for houses at 2.6 for Perth and 1.1 per cent for Sydney, and for units, a 1.2 per cent for the former and 0.4 per cent for the latter.
The study reported Hobart prices for units declined by 0.4 per cent.
Taking stock of the data from SQM’s research, Mr Christopher opined that “the home market will have a very soft landing in 2022 unless we see a surge in listings at the start of the property season in February”.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Noemi Paminuan-Jara
Noemi is a journalist for Smart Property Investment and Real Estate Business. She has extensive experience writing for business, health, and education industries. Noemi is a contributing author of an abstract published by the American Public Health Association, and Best Practices in Emergency Pedagogical Methods in Germany. She shares ownership of the copyright of an instructional video for pharmacists when communicating with deaf patients. She attended De La Salle University where she obtained a double degree in Psychology and Marketing Management.
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