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Liz’s Birthday and nothing to report. Nothing else to do? Have a look around her place.

Victoria continues to lead the nation: more swine flu, slower trains, more mid-city level crossings and extraordinary real estate clearance rates. The last few weeks have seen high clearance rates on low volumes. Last weekend volume was up and there was nary a dent in clearance rates. 667 auctions, 82% of which sold. Even a

There’s one school of thought which suggests that scarcity props prices. There’s another which argues that prices and incomes are related and a shakeout is inevitable. Whichever proves correct in the long term, for now Melbourne is continuing to defy the gravity being felt elsewhere. We have just experienced another more than interesting weekend. The

Top End Trends has come late for some this week. Next week we’ll be working on less haste and more speed… Lost: One Global Financial Crisis. Please return to… The GFC appears to have gone missing in Melbourne. Upper-end Sydney property has died a death, on the Gold Coast they have to give cars away

Melbourne’s temperature did not get out of the teens over the weekend. It was hot! The upper end defied belief and continues to befuddle the so-called experts (and there’s nothing so-called about us), but … But it is very selective. You have a unique period home to sell? Yours is renovated and ready for new

What planet do they live on? Median: “Median (mathematics), the value of the middle member of a set of numbers when they are arranged in order …” That’s clear enough. But it’s nothing but misleading when applied to house prices and it is out-of-date, has little relationship to what is happening now and is not

The portents suggested a quiet weekend: the Anzac Day holiday, few upper-end auctions (and none at the top) and a chill-factor steep enough to keep you huddled in your igloo. Together they promised a big weekend of nothing much. Yet, down below $3 million it was bidders, bidders everywhere and hardly a hammer to drop.

Suddenly it seemed like same time last year. They grew like mushrooms overnight. Buyers were everywhere. But … why? We don’t know for sure, but everywhere we went (and, while not top end, all were good properties) there were between four and eight serious bidders. Our suspicion is that there was a small horde of

The see-saw continues! Gloom at the very top, cheer below that and some signs of life by the bay. Take a quick glance at the papers and you may conclude – amid all the chest thumping about clearance rates (are you there, REIV?) – that the worst is now behind us. Try telling that to

Excitement, anticipation, hope, dissatisfaction, frustration, lack of depth with lists, contempt, delight and large helpings of “What if?” And that’s just the start of the footy season. You should see what’s been happening in real estate. Last week, the top end was full of promises with a mixed bag of lollies the result. What was