Collecting data on the residential Sydney property market is an interesting exercise that vindicates Donald Trump’s view of “Fake News”. It appears that in order to extract accurate information you need to review data for the past six months rather than weekly as provided by the media and property based reporters who call themselves economist.
Sydney is now well entrenched in a downward cycle with the last six months resulting in 10,087 auction sales at an average of $1,067,185 meaning an overall sales total of $10,764,700,000. In comparison the same period last year had about the same total sales from approximately 7,500 sales meaning the average was about $1,300,000.
These figures indicate a greater number of sales are required to generate the same amount as last year. I’ve been reading intently the relative week to week market coverage which seeks to confuse market conditions with rise and fall in property mediums and find too many contradictions to support any other view than the market is deteriorating.
The simple explanation is that more people are seeing their last opportunity to exit this market in view of reasonable prices, before the full brunt of the market correction is felt. My view of the marketplace has not changed in the past two years with this correction looming. The data collected indicates a market place that has already turned and the only support being provided comes from the industry seer’s who have interest in maintaining positive views rather than expressing the anecdotal evidence.
We now see more and more “brave” economists expressing vocally their views, which they have privately held for the past eighteen months. On review it’s easy to see the confusion – the effects of foreign investment combined with developer greed and market fear is a powerful combination that can convolute marketplaces.
An accurate reporting function for the property industry is long overdue. For too many years it has been driven by rumour and those with biased interests to create a sense of panic and apprehension in a market that has been so proudly an Australian icon. Add to this a dose of Government ineptness with an element of greed and when the smoke disappears from the mirror most will see clearly.