The latest CoreLogic Property Market Indicator Summary showed that the week ending October 21 registered a hike in auction volumes, marking the rebound in auction market for the second consecutive week.
A total of 2,119 homes were taken to auction across the combined capital cities, up from 1,851 over the preceding week. It returned a preliminary clearance rate of 49.8%, also higher than the previous week’s 47%.
When compared to 2017’s 2,519 listed homes for auction and clearance rate of 64.7%, the figures at hand are clearly lower. In addition, this is the 4th consecutive week where the clearance rate remained below 50%.
Focusing on the auction headliners, it was observed that Melbourne saw 1,088 auctions during the week with a preliminary clearance rate of just 47.5% — the lowest final clearance rate the city had seen since July 2012.
For reference, the previous week saw a 50.4% success rate across 912 auctions. Over the same week last year, 1,251 auctions were held and a final clearance rate of 70.3% was recorded.
In Sydney, there were 659 homes that went under the hammer, up from 647 over the week before. The preliminary clearance rate of 52.2%, also up from 45.1% last week, but CoreLogic noted that it is likely to track lower over the next few days as the remaining results are collected.
One year ago, 823 auctions were held and the clearance rate stood at 61.3% in Sydney.
The most expensive property bought over the week, meanwhile, was a three-bed, two-bath, and two-car house in Elizabeth Bay, New South Wales (NSW) which sold for $5,500,000. The second-highest sale, meanwhile, was in Dee Why, NSW: a six-bed, five-bath, and two-car house that went for $ 4,550,000.
Similar to last week’s results, Perth was the city with the highest median “time on market” length among houses at 83 days this week— 6 days lower than the previous week. Brisbane came second (67 days), followed by Darwin (56 days).
The report also stated that auction activity traditionally trails upwards around late October through to December every year, and it is not surprising to have weeks where volumes are in excess of 3,000 during these times. As such, the property data firm is anticipating this will be the case this year given the weakening market.
