Rent prices exceed inflation
Rents are expected to grow faster than inflation, new data from SQM revealed.
Figures released last week by the property research house found that vacancy rates were down nationally for the month of February when compared to January 2011, recording a national vacancy rate of 1.7 per cent.
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This is the second consecutive month-on-month decline on vacancies. This is a trend on a national scale, recording falls in all national cities.
“Comparing this figure with data from the same month last year, we can see that there has not been a large degree of change, with a year-on-year difference of only 395 listings, recording a very slight increase compared to February 2010,” SQM Research managing director Louis Christopher.
“Overall, these vacancy statistics reveal an ongoing tight rental market nationwide, with some cities recording tighter results than others.
“This has been resulting in higher than average rental growth per annum as in the case in Sydney, where rents have grown on a compounded basis by 8.8 per cent per annum for the past five years.
“With this type of vacancy rate result, it implies once again that this year we will see rents grow faster than inflation.”
