OK. We told you so.
We’ve been shouting it from the rooftops since Christmas.
The sands have shifted and there’s a new norm coming. Post-Budget, the penny has finally dropped. You can’t pick up a paper or turn on the news without property being the headline.
It’s gone well beyond dinner-table conversation.
The old saying — The Top End is the first to go and the first to slow — is ringing very loudly.
And the question we keep hearing?
Do we sell? Do we renovate? Or do we do nothing?
Guess which is winning.
Nothing. By a mile.
But there are also those who can see what’s coming.
Trending: Iffy
1. Open for inspections?
Mostly agents looking at their shoes.
One wonders why they bother opening the door.
2. Failed campaigns
Right now, launch a Top End campaign and you’ve got a 90%+ chance of hosting a non-event.
Lots of marketing. Lots of photographs. Lots of promises.
Not lots of buyers.
3. The Disappearing House
Three months trying to sell.
Then…
Poompf.
Gone.
Listing disappears in a puff of dust and there’s a muttering that it was never really for sale.
Oh? Really?
4. Negotiations
They’re taking forever.
Buyer here. Vendor there. A very large gap in between.
Most of the transactions that are getting done?
Off-market.
Trending: Positive
It’s not all doom.
1. Real buyers are buying
We know. We’re holding their hands.
The journey just takes longer while both sides search for middle ground.
The difference?
The buyer is holding the Ace.
2. Competitive stress?
Mostly absent.
No stampedes. No elbows. No fear of missing out.
Buyers are gloaters.
3. Mortgage defaults
We haven’t seen them.
Important.
4. Some people simply can’t wait
Life still happens.
Vendors who can’t sit around for another year waiting for the market to change its mind.
Snap! It’s done!
Trending: Future
They’re not making any more AAA property.
Never have. Never will.
Scarcity remains scarcity.
There’s a reason it’s called The Top End.
And that’s a very small paddock.
Who Needs a Barber?
Haircuts everywhere.
And some of them hurt.
People who overpaid — particularly those who paid Top End money a long Uber from the Top End.
73 Nepean Highway, Aspendale — $13.1m.
Double fault in the final set of the Australian Open?
The well-known CEO jumped on a plane, but appears to have left a sizeable chunk of his wealth behind.
Sage advice?
Be very careful paying a record price outside the Top End.
Records are wonderful when you set them.
Less wonderful when you own them.
Elwood: Lonely at the Top
9 Bendigo Avenue — $17.05m.
Everyone was gobsmacked.
Now that number looks very lonely up there.
Being the highest sale in the suburb is only fun when somebody comes along and beats you.
Bayside Takes Gold
There’s a long list.
But the Olympic Medal goes to the swimmer who paid $8.5m for land at 7 Mulgoa Street, Brighton in October 2024.
We’re now told the ask is around $7.2m.
Add holding costs and that’s roughly $100,000 a month disappearing into the pool.
And still no finish line.
Ouch.
Armadale, New York
Someone forgot to tell Armadale it was a suburb.
Six storeys in the favourite street, looking straight into everyone’s back gardens.
Who would have thought apartment towers would become the new Armadale?
And apparently there are more coming.
High Street might need traffic lights for the traffic lights.
The Spring Market: What Spring Market?
The great Spring revival?
Looking increasingly like a dud.
Those thinking of selling have changed their minds.
Those who tried selling have changed their minds.
Those wanting to buy?
Mid-changing is busting out all over.
For the first time in decades, you’re not seeing estate agents queueing up for the next beemer.
Those new to the industry may discover very quickly that selling real estate is harder when real estate doesn’t sell.
The old hands?
Reading the tea leaves.
And It’s Not Just the Agents
Real estate has a long, long food chain.
How are the architects going?
Builders?
Interior designers?
Removalists?
White goods?
Furniture?
When Top End transactions stop, a lot more than an agent’s commission cheque disappears.
The ripples travel.
Amid the Debris
Where it gets interesting.
Because amid all that debris sits opportunity.
There are buyers.
There are sellers.
There are AAA properties.
But this isn’t the market of 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 — or even 2025.
The rules have shifted.
So the question isn’t just where to look.
It’s how to look.
Look different.