Buyers bounce back in Darwin
Darwin property buyers were just waiting for the new financial year to pounce, according to reports from the local market.
According to the general manager of an agency in the city’s centre, the new year has ushered in a “buying blitz”, rebounding from as slow in sales after the last interest rate rise.
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Glenn Grantham, general manager of Raine & Horne Darwin, reported that a substantial number of sales transactions were successfully concluded within the initial days of the new tax year, signalling a “return to form” for the Northern Territory capital market.
Mr Grantham said non-residents made up the bulk of investor interest, with “buyers from the southern states attracted by prices approximately 50 per cent cheaper than Sydney and impressive average investment yields of around 7 per cent.”
In his view, an apparent flatlining of interest in the first half of the year was perhaps overly attributed to the impact of rate rises.
“Enquiries dropped off and we attributed it to buyers reacting to the RBA announcement.
“However, the truth seems that many buyers and vendors were less concerned about interest rates and were merely waiting for the calendar to click over to 1 July.
“Once we hit the new financial year the buying floodgates opened, with contracts exchanged on six properties in the first couple of working days of this tax year,” he said.
Though he acknowledged that the central bank’s rate decisions do certainly play a part in the local area’s market swings. With rates holding steady after last week’s call, he opined that buyer activity would be buoyed.
“Now that the RBA has left rates on hold [last] week, we expect to see buyer enquiries collect some speed again as we journey further into the first month of this financial year.”
In his local market, Mr Grantham remarked that buyers were largely operating in the apartment subsector, seeing good growth prospects for purchases in the CBD.
Many buyers may be responding to areas of opportunity. With activity in most of the capital markets sluggish, Darwin appears to be a good prospect with listing picking up. According to SQM research, Darwin recorded the biggest jump in listings of any capital city between May and June, rising by 6.4 per cent from 1,590 to 1,691.
If the word on the ground is anything to go by, July should show this momentum continuing apace.
