While I expected to see a slow melt, the last two weeks (in Sydney in particular) suggest something else entirely. RP Data was (rightly) criticised for not including seasonality in their new daily index (making Nov/Dec look not so bad and Jan/Feb/Mar look better than it was), but now they have to live and die on the actual daily changes, and they are very illuminating. Indeed, I can honestly say that I've never seen declines as large as their data has displayed since w/c April 30th. In short, Sydney has declined more in two weeks than it did in almost all of 2011, with falls greater than 1% per week in both weeks. Given the recent reports suggesting that the level of discounting has increased and that reductions in interest rates are having no impact (to sales volumes or sentiment), I'm not surprised to see declines - but these falls are off the charts. NB: I appreciate that two weeks is way too short to suggest a trend. Nor am I suggesting it'll continue at the same rate for another 50 weeks (60% annual declines, anyone? lol), but I have watched the daily indices as they have been reported and these numbers are really unusual (with falls on each and every day for the last fifteen days). Read into it what you will...
