UK, US property search up while China interest wanes

Returning Australian expats are looking to be by the water after the number of searches from the US and UK surged.

Several apartments within the Opera Residences at Sydney’s Bennelong Point were on the market for over $9m in 2020.

Returning expats are looking to be by the water after the number of searches from the US and UK surged during the pandemic while Chinese buyers fell away, according to REA Group.

Data from Realestate.com.au showed search into the country was up 57 per cent from the US in 2020 compared to the prior year.

That was followed by rises in Hong Kong (up 17 per cent), Singapore (up 15 per cent) and the UK (up 10 per cent).

Searches spiked from the UK in May and June as Australia began to emerge from its nationwide lockdown.

While US search steadily increased from February, it was not until July that it took pole position for international search, peaking in October. Search almost tripled from the states of Washington (up 197 per cent) and New York (up 183 per cent) last year.

REA Group data analyst Karen Dellow said the turbulent year, politically and health-wise, spurred many to consider relocating home.

“COVID-19 lockdowns, closed borders, the US election and civil unrest all impacted activity from overseas property seekers in 2020, with searches from the US, Hong Kong and the UK all increasing year on year,” she said.

Interest from New Zealand and China dropped year on year, though the former did bump up in January. The numbers do not reflect a conversion to sales.

More expats are tending towards home ownership, while rental search fell 26 per cent.

Beach towns in NSW, Queensland and Western Australia continue to be favoured by searchers from the UK, US and New Zealand, as well as suburbs with large communities of people from those countries.

Noosa Heads in Queensland is in the top five for all three countries, while Sydney’s Manly and Bondi are also popular.

Sydney-based buyers agent Simon Cohen said many of the expats his team were dealing with were returning with $5m-$10m to spend and were looking to be close to the water and prestigious private schools. But the significant price rises over the past few years had priced many out of sought-after markets

“Many thought COVID-19 would have ended by now and are hesitant to drop all that money into a property site unseen,” said Mr Cohen, director of Cohen Handler.

“If you’re an expat who left four years ago, you could buy a waterfront property in their price range. You can’t do that now. Also, it’s not easy to buy, a lot of property is being sold off-market.”

Chinese searches fell 39 per cent over the course of 2020 to just 68,000 in December. Ms Dellow expected Japan and Canada would soon overtake China in search volumes on the site.

Georg Chmiel, executive chairman of Chinese property portal Juwai IQI Group, was surprised that interest from China did not completely fall away last year due to the travel bans and a previous clampdown on foreign buying. But he said he believed buyers would be back and viewed Australia as a safe haven once visitors could return.

“We believe that the real turning point will be around mid-2021,” Mr Chmiel said.

“The ball is falling now, and that’s when it will bounce. We believe families, students, and other travellers will begin to return in significant numbers in the second half. This will serve to return push foreign buyer transactions back into a positive trend.”