Melbourne's property market reported the highest jump in residential listings in May, according to the recent figures from SQM Research.
Over the month, around 4,000 residential properties were added to the city's residential listing stock, equivalent to an 11.6% growth. This brought Melbourne's overall listings to 38,447, the highest amongst all capital cities.
On an annual basis, Melbourne reported the smallest decline in listings at 4.3%.
Australia's national listing stock increased by 3.9% over the month to 304,137. Louis Christopher, managing director at SQM Research, said the increase in the national level was driven by older stock not selling.
"New listings actually fell for the month at the national level, which is abnormal for May. Though we have recorded rises in new listings for Sydney and Melbourne, other cities such as Brisbane, Adelaide and others recorded a decline in new stock," he said.
Rob German, director at Full Circle Property Advocates, said even more stock in Melbourne had been listed in the first few days of June.
“Buyers can take advantage of the market, because while stock levels are down, there is still a fair bit of off-market activity occurring,” German said in a report in The Herald Sun. “It puts buyers in a real position of strength and they can often negotiate to their price.”
The increase in Melbourne's residential listing stock came as prices started to show weakness.
Recent figures from CoreLogic show that Melbourne's median house value declined by 0.9% in May to $686,798.
"With restrictive policies being progressively lifted or relaxed, the downwards trajectory of housing values could be milder than first expected," said Tim Lawless, head of research at CoreLogic.
