RBA interest rate increases finally hit home?

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Rockian
Member
@rockian
Join Date: 2008
Post Count: 85
March 8, 2008 - 10:24 am
Hi Crew,
How is your local RE market faring?
I am on the far Northern NSW Coast and the market here has suddenly changed from strong to dead in a matter of a month. RE Agents are looking depressed and a local one reported to me yesterday that suddenly buyers have gone cold and listings are increasing.
Would be interested to hear the news from other investors around the country?
Ian
Zoe Jones
Member
@zoe-jones
Join Date: 2007
Post Count: 47
March 9, 2008 - 2:35 am
What part of the North Coast are you in?
I'm in Sydney, eastern suburbs. Yesterday happened to drive past an open unit (a very ordinary one at that), at least 80 people milling around on the lawn waiting for the agent to arrive. This was a rental property, there are no rentals left and I have colleagues who are moving back in with Mum and Dad because they can't find anywhere to live. Purchase prices though are pretty much the same, however Is uspect they will go up as all people start banding together to buy a place so they have somewhere to live. A big problem here has been the inflated land tax, land tax on places can be more than the rental return so a lot of investors sell up because of that. It sort of evens out -inflated land tax and interest versus inflating rents.
hleung
Participant
@hleung
Join Date: 2007
Post Count: 141
March 9, 2008 - 6:14 am
I've just come back from talking to a representative at Australand in Carseldine (14km north of Brisbane). 3 house and land packages were put on the market starting at $529,000. They were sold out within 4 hours of release. He showed me the contracts and said that he still has a waiting list of unsatisfied customers. The 3 purchasers were all from interstate with incomes that are double the average.
I think that the market is going to flatten out in some price ranges (very upper and very lower) but don't forget, there are couples out there with very high incomes, who will continue to buy despite interest rate increases.
Australand has no land available for sale in the northside. They expect their next release will have a starting price of $285,000. This is 15% more than their stage 2 release.