Lockdown #4 is hot. It’s looking a lot like #3.
How do you make sense of it?
Like this…
The Six Stages of Top End Lockdown
Stage 1:
Panic: Agents, vendors, the media. Nobody spared. EOI dates abandoned. Everything wanted yesterday. Hardened professionals submerged under stacks of crossed fingers.
A replay of last time.
Stage 2:
Buyers? What about the buyers?
They have time. Time to look, time to dream, time to dream of life-changes. Bidders budding like mushrooms (it’s the season).
Just like last time.
Stage 3:
Too little to buy, too many ready to buy. Banks playing Nostradamus, fanning the flames with 18% price rise predictions (no wonder there’s nobody sitting on their hands).
Like last time?
How do you spell ditto?
Stage 4:
“If only I’d bought before it all locked down.”
Sounds familiar.
Stage 5:
Rumours: “Huge things are happening!” “Off-market.” “You’ll never hear about it.” “It’s all under the surface.”
Again.
Stage 6:
“It’ll never last.”
It does. Just like last time.
Meanwhile, back at the coalface…
Land. The litmus test.
That noise you heard last week was the shattering of a record.
$12,200/sq m.
A leap above the $11-12k that was rolling eyes a month ago.
Where? Toorak. Where else?
Them there hills…
The well heeled are pulling on their gummies and stomping out of town. Acreage within 90 minutes of Melbourne never looked so buyable. Within an hour? Even better.
Money? What else is there to do with it?
Like last time? Well…
Psst! Wanna buy an apartment?
It’s grand. It’s top end. It has all the mod cons. Everything you can think of except a buyer.
There’s a squillion of them (apartments, not buyers).
For sellers, that’s the problem. Supply and demand rules. Again.
Auction clearance rate 77%. Who cares?
… as reported by Domain last weekend.
If you’re looking at the top end, it’s a useless statistic. Every home here is its own market.
Negotiation makes that market.
Missing In Action
Underquoting is the other epidemic.
Consumer Affairs Victoria was missing pre-COVID and is missing still.
We know the XXXXers who are underquoting at the top end. We know it’s why their businesses are hurting.
Now buyers are rumoured to be rallying around a petition to get the government onto them.
We can’t wait.
Let’s hope the banks are wrong
If that 18% is right, it’s going to be a very expensive year.
Stay safe.