wow, what can be "something" for the vendor to settle quick?

I think both are good to living in. But (2) can be a better investment item after a few years.

I have heard that the government plans to cut 20000 positions. Looks like a rumor but it also makes sense as the government is running out of surplus. And it is certain that the tax income is going to drop tremendously too.

The hesitation of banks to cut mortgage rate prove  that the banks have not been doing good. The steep cut in interest rate from reserve bank has a positive impact to the markets, however, why we need a steep cut? I don't think the government is trying to make the property price goes up, if it is, the government is overdoing it.

People said that we are lack of land and houses. Yes, but  imagine in Sydney region (the most crowded region), 6 or less people living in a 200m house with 3 bedrooms and 300m of yard. Such properties can always accommodate more people. A lot of older people even living alone in a big house. Of course, more crowded means lower quality of living. however, mind set gonna change. We have a lot of buffer! (A friend of mine is living in 70/F of an apartment with only 50m area but costs 1 million AUD in Hong Kong. Yes, 70/F, not a typo) While we cannot compare with the extremes, it is very true that we have buffer.

People scatters and thus public transport don't earn much money.

I still believe that the land price will go up. All regions should become more crowded. Houses pull down replaced by a few storeys apartment. If you see the figures, people don't make much money on such project. What if the land price doubled or triple? Building companies need to build a larger scale project (say, a 7 storeys building) in order to make money.