WESTERN AUSTRALIA
BOOM TIMES ARE BACK
It has been a while but conditions continue to heat up in Western Australia . House prices in Perth are still 12.5 per cent below the last peak in June 2014 however rents , a generally reliable indicator of future price growth in this market , are now only two per cent below the May 2013 peak . There is still a while to run for this red hot market .
Unusually , the Perth market is strong at a time all other Australian markets are also strong . It ’ s benefitting from the same things as pretty much everywhere else - very low interest rates , high savings rates and low numbers of COVID cases . It ’ s however being turbocharged by particularly strong iron ore export growth . Iron ore sales surged by 20 per cent in May , with most of the growth attributed to China .
The suburbs doing well in Perth are a mix , ranging from affordable Medina to City Beach which has just hit a
$ 2 million median . At a more aggregated level , it ’ s the Local Government Area ( LGA ) of Cottesloe that is seeing the strongest growth . All price points across the city are doing well however there is a slight tilt to some of Perth ’ s most expensive suburbs .
Outside of Perth , the impact of the mining boom becomes more apparent . At a LGA level , Port Hedland tops the list when it comes to price growth , increasing by 45 per cent over the past 12 months . Although very strong growth , prices are still down 40 per cent from where they were five years ago , showing the choppy nature of mining town prices .
The other clear trend is the demand for beachside and treechange regional locations . Like the rest of Australia , changes to the way people work and demand for second homes has been a driver of demand in regional towns .
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