ACT Canberra 2019 and beyond thread

Just thought I'd start a new Canberra thread for general property discussion. Is anyone looking to buy this year? We are considering selling up but not sure if it's worth it from a value for money or timing perspective.

We're in a 3 bedroom house in central Belconnen and are looking to move to the southside - specifically around Mawson, Torrens and Pearce as that's about as close as we could get within budget. Wanniassa seems to be good value but I don't know much about the area. Our budget is about 650k with the possibly to go up to 700k if it was a really nice and/or well located house. We want three bedrooms and don't really care about block size.

What are your thoughts on the way the property market is going in Canberra?

 

Thanks for starting another Canberra thread @Cimbon! I always comment on Canberra, but hey, it's the only city that I really know the market well so why not! I think SQM research is accurate with their asking prices, rents and vacancy rate graphs for Canberra as a whole. The asking price/median peaked in Nov last year at about 830k (for detached houses), dropped back down to under 800k between Nov 18 and about May this year, and since the election and the incentives for first homebuyers in the ACT from July 1, has lifted back up to 812k. I have been out at a few opens the past couple of weekends and spoken to agents and the above seems accurate, interest has lifted for houses the past couple of months. Even for apartments, the good ones (location, orientation, size, small blocks) are going under contract fairly quickly despite the thousands being built, particularly between Dickson and the city. Rents were crazy in Jan/Feb/March this year but have since dropped as vacancies have risen from 0.8% to 1.2%. Good properties still renting fast but the average/poor ones sitting longer, whereas before everything was getting snapped up. It's seasonal for Canberra, the best time to put your place up for rent is January/Feb. I had a tenant leave and had to rent my Braddon apartment out in April/May and it sat empty for about 7 weeks, whereas back in Jan/Feb it was gone in a few days. Hard to predict going forwards, was this just a short term bounce or will we see another growth phase? I don't know, but my best guess is prices are pretty high already and this lift will probably be short term. I am still predicting a reasonably flat period of growth for next 2-3 years (maybe 2-3% growth per annum?) as we had a good run of growth for several years up to Nov 2018. Population growth is solid and the public service isn't going anywhere although some relocation of agencies does hurt a bit, still 60,000 people employed in PS. Can't ever see an oversupply of houses happening in Canberra due to lack of land and slow releasing of land and high demand for detached houses, although units is a different story. All land to be released now will be on the fringes of the ACT so I don't think this will affect the prices in the well established and located suburbs. Investors also not flocking to Canberra due to ridiculously high land tax and rates so that will probably keep vacancies fairly low, despite apartment oversupply. Keen to hear what others think

 

Thanks @Todd. In which suburbs have you been going to the opens?

 

We are considering moving to Bruce as one daughter now in high school and we want to be closer so having a look around Bruce, Kaleen, Giralang. Also looked at some apartments in Braddon and Lyneham just out of curiosity really. Apartment opens not very well attended and the agent said one of them had been on market for 8 weeks and zero offers, but houses there were plenty of people. I am liking Dickson now with the light rail stop and the redevelopment of that town centre, so the apartments in Lyneham but close to Northbourne, Dickson and light rail stop (around Oliver St) are maybe not a bad buy.

 

*gets this years council bills*

rent $23400 (old house 3x1)
land tax $3200
rates $2450

enough said

 

Just read this on Facebook (Better Renting)


Excellent news: the ACT Government has made a time-bound commitment to introduce minimum energy efficiency standards for rental properties, as part of the ACT Climate Change Strategy for 2019-25!

This is an invaluable policy development. Minimum standards will help vulnerable people across society to adapt to the extreme summers that climate change is already causing. They'll also help with reducing the pollution that causes climate change, and with helping low-income households to cut their power bills.

We've been working toward this for a long time and it's great to see this commitment. We're grateful to everyone who's been part of the #HealthyHomes campaigning calling for a response like this.

This isn't it though - we will keep up our work to make sure that the requirements are as ambitious as they need to be to make sure that people who rent can share in the benefits of a fast and fair transition away from polluting fossil fuels.

 

not sure how much help a 20$ reduction in those poor vulnerable people's power bill will help them

 

I have always avoided the ACT for investment for that exact reason: Its a state that does annualised land tax (instead of the one-time up front stamp duty that most other states do).

I also avoid states in the US that similarly have any/high annualised land tax (they just call it 'state taxes' there).

Also, there seems to be not much scarcity in Canberra. It can sprawl out well beyond the ACT borders into surrounding NSW suburbs. Because it is a newer city also... there is less rarity in architectural styles too.

I'm sure there are great deals to be had in ACT but with the high taxes, high buy-in prices, endless sprawl; for me I've never been able to make it work.

 

Does anyone here know much about unit titled blocks in the ACT? These are the larger Mr Fluffy blocks that have been split into two to allow dual occupancies to be built but the land is not fully subdivided. This means you can purchase and build on each half of the block separately. One builder we spoke to said we'd need to speak to the owner of the house on the back half to get them to agree to separate the services so we have our own connections and didn't seem to recommend building there.

 

My first post and I have a question for anybody with Canberra property experience. Has anybody known of a vacant block of "single residential" land Zoned RZ1 selling for under the Govt. Unimproved Valuation?

 

See attached a list of i believe My Fluffy Blocks the ACT government is trying to sell.

None even close to the unimproved value.