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ISCOVER
Staff Reporter
Economic instability is forcing many home owners to hold onto their properties for longer.
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According to RP Data’s latest research, 10 years ago the hold period between sales was 6.8 years and now in 2011 it is 8.6 years.
Melbourne and Sydney home owners tend to remain in their homes the longest. Research analyst Cameron Kusher said that this is likely due to higher purchase prices of homes which then results in higher transaction costs.
On the other hand, Mr Kusher said that home owners in Darwin, Adelaide and Hobart tend to transact homes on a more frequent basis – a trend he attributes to cheaper property prices along with lower sale costs imposed on the vendor when selling.
In regional areas, the longest hold periods are located in Victoria.
“This is reflective of the fact that state and the capital city (Melbourne) have the longest average hold period,” Mr Kusher said.
Outside of Victoria and New South Wales none of the council areas with the longest hold periods are within the capital city regions.
Monash in south-east Melbourne held the nation’s longest average hold period during the last year at 12.6 years.
Focusing on regions with the shortest average hold period, these council areas were almost exclusively located within Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. The mining region of Port Hedland in north-west Western Australia had the nation’s shortest average hold period over the past year at just 4.7 years.
“Mining regions feature heavily in the list of regions with the shortest average hold period - none of those council areas listed are within a capital city. In fact, most of the regions listed aren’t even within a major regional population centre,” Mr Kusher said.
