Sales and prices have shot up in this one city in the past few weeks, with buyers ‘coming in heavy’ given houses are priced below $510k.
Derek Hart of Elders Top End Group said investor enquiry in the Darwin market began picking up about four months ago with strong interest in houses below $510,000, but has accelerated in the past few weeks..
“For the last six years there hasn’t been much investor activity and about 95 per cent of our buyers were owner occupiers,” he said. “Now it’s 60 per cent owner occupiers and 40 per cent investors. They’ve been coming in heavy in the last six weeks”
Mr Hart said building inspectors, pest inspectors and conveyancers were all “flat out” now, with most calls coming from buyers agents for southern investors.
“There’s definitely an increase in transactions happening,” he said.
Daniel Harris of Real Estate Central said his agency was seeing a similar trend with a 30 per cent spike in sales in the past eight weeks.
“Over 90 per cent of our buyers in recent years have been owner occupiers but that’s been flipped on its head,” he said.
“We’re seeing a 50/50 ratio of owner occupier to investor in the past couple of months.
“At least a third of our deals are off market and a lot of these transactions are through professional buyer’s agents.”
PropTrack data showed preliminary sales in Darwin were up 15 per cent in September compared to 12 months ago.
Mr Harris said this data didn’t tell the whole story of what was happening at the coal face in the Darwin real estate sector with figures skewed due to off market sales and the lag caused by settlement times.
He said a number of factors were contributing to the uptick in real estate activity in Darwin.
“Some people are saying the change in government is driving consumer confidence, some are saying it’s the new grants, while some are saying it’s gas or defence projects,” Mr Harris said.
“I think that’s all playing a role, however the main thing driving (increased interest in Darwin real estate) is that Darwin has become so much cheaper than other capital cities in the country and the yields on offer are so much higher.
“Every other capital has had their run.
“Investors moved from Brisbane and Adelaide, then Perth was the recent flavour and now it seems it’s Darwin’s turn.”