SQM Research has released its rental vacancies report for the month of May, which revealed that the vacancy rate nationally has remained flat at 1.8%, with Melbourne (3.1% vacancy rate) once again leading the nation. Year-on-year however, vacancies have risen by 7,270, with the national vacancy rate increasing by 0.2% since May 2011.
The below table from SQM Research summarises vacancy rates at the capital city and national levels. Please note that SQM Research has revised its vacancy rate for Canberra by including the All Homes Data.
The key points about the release are as follows:
- Nationally, vacancies remained the same during the month of May, recording a vacancy rate of 1.8% and a total of 50,408 vacancies across the country.
- Melbourne has recorded the highest vacancy rate of the capital cities – revealing a vacancy rate of 3.1% and a total of 11,427 vacancies.
- Darwin has recorded the tightest vacancy rate of the capital cities at 0.4% – a total of 100 vacancies.
- Hobart has recorded the highest yearly vacancy rate increase, rising by 0.9% to 2.6% since May 2011 and coming to a total of 753 vacancies.
- Darwin has recorded the most substantial yearly fall, with vacancy rates dropping by 0.9% to 0.4%, coming to a total of 100 vacancies.
- Most capital cities either remained the same during the month of May or dropped slightly with no capital cities recording monthly increases.
Louis Christopher, Managing Director of SQM Research noted the following about the nation’s rental vacancy rates:
“For many months now, vacancies across most of the country have remained very low ensuring that competition is fierce between prospective tenants, particularly at the affordable end of the market. As we have continually stated, we see no relief on that front, other than in Melbourne where there is still many more dwellings coming onto the market this year.”
SQM’s calculations of vacancies are based on online rental listings that have been advertised for three weeks or more compared to the total number of established rental properties. SQM considers this a superior methodology compared to using a potentially incomplete sample of agency surveys or merely relying on raw online listings advertised.
Further information about SQM’s methodology can be found here and the charts pertaining to SQM’s rental vacancy rates can be found here.
