Keep it local: top tip for buyers, sellers in 2024

Just three weeks into the year, homebuyers and sellers are likely to be already suffering from forecast fatigue. So how do you know who and what to trust?

Just three weeks into the year, and sellers and buyers are likely to unnecessarily be already suffering from forecast fatigue.

For what it’s worth, almost every property analyst has now advised how they see the direction of the national market during 2024.

There is a consensus view plus the more negative and positive extremes – anything from a 5 per cent decline to a 10 per cent boom.

So far there’s been sparse data and few anecdotal occurrences to validate any of the forecasts amid what is still the summer holiday season. They are yet to come, with the first sign set to come from the volume of early bird listings.

Market predictions for 2024 have come thick and fast.

Price direction is quickly influenced by supply and then of course demand, which is a little harder to detect until we start seeing auction results.

According to data from SQM Research, December witnessed a 5 per cent decline in nationwide residential property listings at 234,000 as all major cities experienced a decrease in listings. The decrease was similar to the December 2022 decline.

The volume of fresh listings entering the late 2023 market sat at 54,400, which was similar to the prior December. The presence of older listings that have been for sale for over 180 days sits at 62,000, an increase of around 6 per cent annually. Distressed listings fell by 17 per cent to 5400 over the month to remain at benign levels.

In Sydney, the total listings stood at 26,600 at year’s end, which was up 3 per cent annually. There were 7700 new listings, which was a 22 per cent jump on the prior December, while the 4800 listings for sale for over 180 days was down 13 per cent on the same month in 2022. Distressed listings rose by 6 per cent to 1200.

Year-on-year listings figures are similar. Picture: Julian Andrews

Interesting characteristics, but market participants – actual or potential – ought burrow further into the local data to enable informed decisions.

It is suburban data that ought to shape buying and selling decisions along with a sense of what’s happening in the overall economy and the wider demographics such as population growth.

Werrington County, 50km west of the Sydney CBD, was identified by PropTrack as one of the fastest-selling suburbs during 2023. The mid-1980s housing estate ranks high in owner-occupiers, mostly four, five and six bedroom houses on good size blocks.

It finished the year off with 294 offerings of which 91 had come during December which was similar to December 2022 numbers, and much of the past three years.

The offerings were well down on the 650 listing peak in December 2016 but up on the 193 low of December 2019.

Werrington County had just 34 sales last year, finishing off in mid-December with a $1.15m year high sale. There were 60 sales in 2022. This January has already seen one of December’s listings sell at $950,000.

Originally published as Keep it local: top tip for buyers, sellers in 2024