COVID-19 hot spots drive homebuyers to regional Victoria

While experts are predicting property prices will fall because of the pandemic, it seems houses in regional Victoria will be in demand. Here’s why agents are bullish on the market.

Homes like this one in Harrietville are proving to be popular with city dwellers.

IN A pandemic paradox, rural real estate seems to be dodging a bullet, say the majority of provincial agents.

While national house prices are tipped to plummet a further 10 per cent in the next year, country agents are confident an enormous demand for rural properties from city dwellers seeking to escape COVID hot spots will get them to the other side.

“I haven’t seen it stronger in my 20-year career,” said Pat Rice & Hawkins manager and auctioneer Matt Childs of the demand for country property from mainly city-based clients, adding that one Tallarook property alone recently attracted 35 offers.

“Since March we’ve seen a real uptake in buyer demand, no question. Some results we achieved throughout March, April and May were extraordinary. They shocked us in regards to how they went, even though we were really restricted and hampered by what was going on.”

Regions within easy driving of the CBD are prime targets in the rush from suburbia.

This is good for many country agents, yet distinctly rural areas such as Yarra Junction, 55km north of Melbourne, are hindered as they still fall under metropolitan restrictions. “If we were in stage 3 that would be fantastic but we’re still in stage 4,” bemoans Professionals Yarra Junction’s Ashleigh Hall. “We feel like we’re in the country but we’re not.”

Agents are reporting house in regional Victoria are selling as quickly as they list them.

Here, Mr Hall said those itching for a country escape vary from young families to professionals looking to set up a second home from which to bunker down or run a business.

In a happier position is Biggin & Scott Daylesford’s Michael DeVincentis who said properties sell as fast as he finds them, and nearly all to Melbourne buyers.

“An hour ago I listed a nice 1945 farmhouse on 2½ acres that’s been split from the main farmhouse, and already I’ve had two inquiries,” he said.

When one of his top salespeople, Rae Corris, listed two properties on a Friday, she had sold both by Monday, one for $35,000 over asking price.

Matt Childs believed low interest rates, combined with lockdown conditions demonstrating working from home is now quite feasible, have fuelled demand.

“We have had a pretty good season agriculturally this year, plus putting your money elsewhere might be a bit risky. The share market is so up and down and it feels like commercial real estate might have some trouble, and there’s just the overall impact of the virus itself,” he said.

Despite this surge, all country agents are beset by a dire shortage of properties.

That property scarcity is in turn pushing some country prices higher, prompting agents to launch education programs to convince would-be vendors of the likelihood of gaining good prices.

It’s predicted further easing of pandemic restrictions could push prices higher still.

Yet agents are wary of what might happen if fresh outbreaks occur.

“The negative still might come,” warned Mr Childs. “The economic damage could be so great that it does have impact.”

Ellie Bonnett at her house in Daylesford. Picture: Yuri Kouzmin

PANDEMIC FEARS PROMPT CITY ESCAPE

YOUNG, successful and working as a human resources director in Melbourne for a global tech company, Ellie Bonnett seemingly had it all.

Yet for several years Ellie had dreamt of quitting city life for the fresh-air freedom of the bush.

It might have remained a dream but for COVID-19. Frustrated by the effect COVID anxiety was having on the mental wellbeing of those around her, last month Ellie, 33, quit the one-bedroom city apartment she rented and where she was working remotely.

She started a new life in the first house of her own, a “lovely” two-bedroom dwelling on a 1ha block opposite Lake Daylesford, 90 minutes from Melbourne.

She had few personal fears of catching COVID in Melbourne yet she hated the way its mere presence was harming lives.

“For me the thing around COVID was more the divide it was leading to in terms of people – of what we hear, and then people forming their own basis of what they believe is fact.

“In the city people would be yelling at one another. A friend of mine is a doctor and he would sit on a park bench to eat a sandwich and someone would yell at him to put a mask on after he had done a big shift in the hospital.

“I think that’s everywhere. But in the country it’s a bit more safe, and there’s more support because people, in my experience so far, are better connected.”

It helped too that Ellie’s international employer had just advised staff that post-COVID it would be turning its back on offices in preference for remote employment.

But for the pandemic, admits Ellie, she probably wouldn’t have had the confidence to make the move.

The pandemic prompted Ellie Bonnett to move to the country. Picture: Yuri Kouzmin

“I won’t lie. There were always those first buying fears. Should I buy in COVID? … But I didn’t want a global pandemic stopping me from achieving my goal.”

Ellie was lucky she bought quickly, from Daylesford agent Michael DeVincentis of Biggin & Scott. She signed the deal for just under $600,000 in May, just before the worst of the restrictions – and because she already had a house and had lined up a removalist, was allowed to go ahead with the move.

Born in Cairns, Ellie was delighted with her Daylesford welcome.

“The neighbourhood’s incredible,” she said. “I was left flowers and a list of people’s numbers to call in the area, and I’ve Zoomed with my neighbours. It’s just such a unique, eclectic community.”

For her the move is a life-improving journey, “looking at what I want, what I care about”.

“That’s how I’m living my life at the moment, trying as much as possible to focus on gratitude and kindness and spending as much time away from the news as possible.

“When I go for a walk I can admire nature – and yes, there’s an awful virus that’s living with us now, but it’s not going away.

“Make good choices about the planet, good choices about what I eat. All of that comes into it. COVID has taken me down that wellness, spiritual path.”

Yet Ellie hasn’t forgotten what she left.

“A lot of the people I work with are really struggling with this extension of Stage 4, with young families, with their own mental health, without being able to socialise.”

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