melbourne: 22 and 23 october

Last week:

The clearance rate remained at 54% after the Wednesday update.

There were 720 auctions expected pre-weekend, with 710 accounted for in the Wednesday result. (677 + Postponed: 12, Withdrawn: 12, Auctions with no result: 9 = 710). Rpdata gave total auctions at 743 for the week.

Total sales volume was up: $465.1mil in comparison to last week ($367.25mil), as were private sales: 483 (393 week prior).

Big weekend this week with 875 auctions expected. Last week the clearance rate bounced from the lows, however private sales, although higher than last week still seem to be lagging. Will be very interesting to watch this weekend.

Here's the preview from REIV.

Auction preview 22-23 October 2011

Last weekend: 677 auctions, clearance rate of 54 per cent
This weekend: 875 auctions
This weekend last year: 1127 auctions, clearance rate of 67 per cent
This weekend 2009: 891 auctions, clearance rate of 82 per cent

This weekend there are 875 auctions expected, the highest since the weekend of 23 and 24 April, when there were 962 auctions, with a clearance rate of 61 per cent.

The lower clearance rates this year are reflected in the latest median price release.

It shows that the median price of a home sold at private sale has dropped by one per cent from $485,000 to $480,000 over July, August and September.

This is a better result than that recorded for homes sold at auction, whose median price dropped by 5.1 per cent from $725,750 to $690,500 and is a sign that buyers are demanding more affordable homes.