00:01For the housing market, we've seen this is the fifth straight month that house values
00:05have declined and naturally we've seen a drop of just under a percent there.
00:10And leading the charge was the biggest property market in the country, which was Sydney, which
00:14dropped almost one and a half percent and that was followed by Melbourne and Canberra
00:18as well, which dropped by just a percent there.
00:21Now this is coming amidst a lot of uncertainty in the housing market and whilst there has
00:25been five straight months of decline, we have seen that house prices are still up slightly
00:30year on year compared to 12 months ago.
00:33So the average house price in Australia is about $912,000.
00:37What's interesting about this is that we've seen this has spread more broadly as well.
00:41Regional cities have largely avoided this decline for the most part throughout the year.
00:45But this new data shows that this slump is hitting regional cities as well.
00:48So it's not just limited to the capital cities there.
00:50So still up year on year, as you say, but what is it that's pushing prices down each month?
00:57Well, it's been a tough year, particularly with a lot of economic uncertainty.
01:00And one of the big factors in that is interest rates.
01:02We've seen three consecutive interest rate hikes from the Reserve Bank, and that's in a bid to
01:07push down inflation and keep consumer prices low.
01:11And so that's really dampened consumer confidence there.
01:14We've seen that hit record lows, which has really been reflected in the demand for houses.
01:19A second change that has really lessened consumer and investor appetite is a change to the capital
01:25gains tax discount, which we saw in the federal budget in May.
01:29And that's very much dampened the appetite for investors, for particularly existing properties.
01:34Meanwhile, Victoria is introducing new laws to crack down on underquoting by real estate agents.
01:41Take us through how these laws will work.
01:43Yes. Well, this is a first for the country.
01:45Victoria is implementing new laws to tackle underquoting, which is when a real estate agent
01:50markets a property for a price significantly lower than what it will realistically sell for.
01:55And what this does is it artificially generates interest.
01:58It gets people to the auction and it can be used to pump up prices.
02:02Well, the Victorian government in October will be tackling that.
02:05And there will be hefty fines up to $48,000 if this is done by real estate agents.
02:10So, for consumers, what this means is that the reserve price, which is the lowest price
02:14that a seller will accept, has to be published at least a week before an auction.
02:19It also means that the final sale price will be published as well.
02:22So, it means a lot more transparency as well.
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