Auction Clearance Rates Improve?

Its the silly season  down under! Its the time of the year when people's thoughts are about spending too much money for unwanted presents, eating too much and generally going on holiday. Its not traditionally a good time to buy/sell or rent houses.

Except  that's not what the figures are showing! The Australian newspaper is reporting that:

Saturday auction clearances in Sydney were 45.6 per cent, a 4per cent rise on the previous week. Of 323 auctions, 124 properties sold under the hammer and 51 before the auction.

Almost $102 million worth of real estate was involved in the sales. A four-bedroom house at Karialla Avenue, Lane Cove North, was the most expensive, selling for $1.8 million.

The cheapest was a $176,000 two-bedroom unit at Northumberland Road, Auburn.

Interestingly though the reports are from Sydney that crowds were down and that there was little to no investor interest. Which suggests that instead owner-occupiers are finally starting to react to the 3% drop in interest rates since September, the increased amounts of the first-home owner's grant, and the general reduction in petrol prices flowing through to people's pockets.

Melbourne also had an increase of 1.8% in their auction clearance rate to 48%, still substantially down on last years figures.

Adelaide's clearance rate almost doubled to 37% - but on a very thin market of only 25 properties, so that one goes under statistics and lies!

Brisbane rates were also slightly up to 23.1% from 21.9% the previous but the big news in Queensland is the apparent $21,500 drop in Brisbane house prices to a median price of $473,000 in September. The real estate institute is claiming that this is because there has been a marked increase in properties under $500,000 selling - or maybe they are the only properties priced to meet the market?