Regions Lead 2022 Price Growth
Regional Australia continued to outperform the capital cities in 2022, with dwelling values rising marginally last year in the Combined Regions, compared to a 6.9% decline in the Combined Capitals.
That’s according to CoreLogic data, which shows the Combined Regions recorded a 0.1% increase in dwelling values in 2022, helped by a 2.2% increase in regional apartment markets.
Across the house markets, the Combined Regions fell just 0.2% while the Combined Capitals decreased 7.4%. The outstanding house markets last year were in South Australia: the median price for Adelaide rose 9.6%, while Regional SA increased a nation-leading 17.7%.
Other markets to record annual increases in their median house prices included Perth (4%), Darwin (4.5%), Regional WA (5.6%), Regional Tasmania (3.1%), Regional Queensland (1.2%) and Regional Northern Territory (2.7%).
Among the unit markets, those to record annual growth in median prices included Brisbane (6.7%), Adelaide (14%), Darwin (4%), Perth (1.1%) Canberra (2.6%), Regional Queensland (4.5%), Regional SA (6.7%) and Regional WA (8.3%).
Consumers Optimistic On Prices in 2023
Australian consumers collectively have shrugged off the negative forecasts of economists, with a key consumer sentiment survey showing that more people expect house prices to rise than fall in 2023.
The Westpac-Melbourne Institute House Price Expectations Index shows a sharp uplift in the public’s property price expectations, with the index surging 27.6%.
This is at odds with high-profile economists who predict “the downturn” will continue, but consumers have a better track record in forecasting property prices than bank economists.
Westpac senior economist Matthew Hassan was left baffled by the shift in consumer sentiment and claims consumers will be disappointed – but Hassan has a particularly poor record in predicting house prices.
Westpac forecast that Australian property prices would fall 10% in 2020, but prices rose. The bank predicted a 4% rise in prices in 2021, but they increased more than 25%.
Hotspotting and other specialist real estate analysts like Louis Christopher of SQM Research and Simon Pressley of Propertyology are forecasting price growth in 2023.
