Tight rental market here to stay
There is no change in sight for the Australian rental market, with October recording another “excessively tight” national vacancy rate of 1.8 per cent, SQM Research managing director Louis Christopher said.
“For the mean time we do not see any light at the end of the tunnel where the rental market is concerned,” Mr Christopher said.
“The trends remain the same with no change in sight.”
Vacancy rates have remained consistently tight in recent months, with October recording a slight fall of 0.1 per cent – with total vacancies now sitting at 45,896 nationally.
Melbourne is leading the way in vacancies for capital cities, remaining steady with a vacancy rate of three per cent and 10,956 vacancies.
Canberra continues to experience the tightest vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent – a total of 302 vacancies. It is closely followed by Perth, where vacancies fell 0.2 per cent during October to 0.7 per cent (1,119 vacancies).
Perth and Hobart experienced the largest monthly declines, both falling by 0.2 per cent during the month of October 2011 to 0.7 per cent and 1.9 per cent, respectively.
Sydney vacancy rates remained steady at 1.3 per cent in Octoboer, with a total of 7,356 vacancies.
The Real Estate Institute of New South Wales (REINSW) found that vacancy rates rose slightly (0.2 per cent) in Sydney’s middle suburbs and outer suburbs (0.1 per cent).
“There will be no relief for tenants until we see interventionist action to encourage private investment, as well as slashing that planning red tape which is slowing new residential development,” said REINSW President Wayne Stewart.
“Until then, we will see growing numbers of people competing against each other for an ever smaller number of available properties,” said Mr Stewart.