The capital city which rose in value over April

Data revealing the state of the Australian property market over April has been released, showing that every capital city bar one saw a decline, but the rate of decline is easing.

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According to the CoreLogic April 2019 home value index, dwelling values in Australia declined by 0.5 per cent down to 7.2 per cent.

However, declines have been slowing down, compared to December’s national dwelling value fall of 1.1 per cent.

For the month, every capital city except for Canberra declined – the nation’s capital city rose by 0.4 of a percentage point to $596,405.

Darwin saw the biggest decline at 1.2 per cent down to $390,621, followed by Hobart, which fell by 0.9 of a percentage point; Sydney, which fell 0.7 of a percentage point down to $780,672; Melbourne, which fell by 0.6 of a percentage point down to $621,759; then Brisbane and Perth, which both fell by 0.4 of a percentage point down to $484,047 and $440,546, respectively; and then Adelaide, which only fell by 0.1 of a percentage point down to $430,352.

The easing seen in the national decline is also being felt in Sydney and Melbourne, CoreLogic head of research Tim Lawless said.

“In December last year, Sydney dwelling values were down -1.8 per cent, with the pace of month-on-month falls progressively moderating back to -0.7 per cent in April. Similarly, Melbourne values were down -1.5 per cent in December, with the rate of decline improving to -0.6 per cent in April.”

Mr Lawless added that this, combined with a rise in mortgage-related valuations, improvement in ABS household finance data for February, and auction clearance rates holding around 50 per cent, means that the housing market has potentially moved past the worst of the downturn.

“Values are still broadly declining; however, the pace of decline has moderated since December last year and there are some tentative signs that credit flows have improved, albeit from a low base,” he said.

“Considering that tighter credit conditions were one of the primary catalysts for the housing market downturn, any sign that credit availability is improving would be a welcome outcome for the housing market.

“The prospect for lower interest rates is another factor that could support an improvement in housing market activity later this year.”

In Sydney and Melbourne, the most expensive quarter of the housing market are seeing the largest annual declines at declines of 11.8 per cent and 13.7 per cent, respectively, while the majority of the other cities are seeing less value decline disparity between the upper and lower quarters of the market.

Rents

Nationally, rents rose by 0.3 of a percentage point over April to 4.1 per cent, according to CoreLogic’s national hedonic rental index.

This was seen by rises in Melbourne at 0.5 of a percentage point, Perth at 0.4 of a percentage point, the ACT and Sydney both at 0.3 of a percentage point, Brisbane at 0.2 of a percentage point and Hobart at 0.1 of a percentage point. Both Darwin and Adelaide held steady.

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