Welcome to this week’s Acreage Market Wrap where I share an insight into How’s The Acreage Market?

So, earlier this week, the Reserve Bank left interest rates on hold at the RBA’s first meeting of the year. This decision was made despite the economic fallout from Australia's recent bushfires and the global impact that China's coronavirus outbreak is starting to have on foreign trade as well as consumer confidence. It will be interesting to see what the Reserve Bank decides to do over these coming months.

In the meantime, the RBA's cash rate remains at a record low 0.75 per cent, which is where it’s been since the last 25-basis-point rate cut back in October last year.

The decision to leave rates on hold should help sustain property growth but also keep the housing market from overheating too rapidly and should go a long way towards keeping APRA (the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority) on the sidelines for a while, which will allow the recovery of the acreage market to continue throughout 2020.

In other news, the NSW Acting Valuer General, Paul Chudleigh said that they have now completed land valuations for every parcel of land across NSW. To better explain the impacts of these latest valuations, these land values reflect the value of the land component of a property only, and are based upon the value as at the 1st of July 2019, which was around the same time that the Sydney property market bottomed out.

Now the local councils use Valuer General land valuations to calculate the rateable value of a property and they use a multiplier to assess how much they will charge for the land rates portion of your rates.

There are many acreage owners who are very angry with the exorbitant rates council are currently charging, especially when you consider the services or lack thereof that councils actually provide amongst the acreage areas.

New valuations from the office of the NSW Acting Valuer General will be progessively issued to land owners from January 15 to the end of April 2020.

With Council elections scheduled for later this year, it will be very interesting to see if there’s any reduction to land rates passed on or proposed and whether any believable, significant changes are promised by those candidates seeking election.

I have a meeting scheduled with one of the Councillors at Hawkesbury City Council early this week to raise a number of major concerns that I have for acreage owners.

If you’re on acreage and you have any concerns that you’d like raised with the Councillor, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me.

So, what’s happening in the acreage market?

As expected there’s now more acreage stock coming onto the market, in fact there were…

17 new acreage properties listed this week and there are currently 395 acreage properties For Sale across the entire region.
This overall total includes 226 acreage properties For Sale throughout all of The Hawkesbury, 123 in The Hills and another 46 For Sale within Sydney’s North-West acreage areas of Penrith and Blacktown.
But, there’s only been 5 acreage properties Sold this week and all of these 5 sales were only in The Hills acreage area with none occurring in the other areas.

However, on a more positive note there are 15 properties that are currently ‘Under Contract’ across the entire region which should lead to increased sales figures once these pending sales go through the process of unconditionally exchanging contracts.

But the reality is that with the current rate of new acreage stock coming onto the market, it will take a dramatic increase in sales volume over the coming few months before we look at getting back to a booming sellers market in the acreage sector again.

Out in the field this week, there were a lot of enquiries from buyers along with good numbers at today’s Open Homes despite the rainy conditions. I’ve also noticed an increase in enquiry from acreage owners who are currently getting their property prepared to go to market who are after some tips, as well as, receiving requests from several others owners who have been unsuccessful in selling their acreage property and have asked me to see if I can help them out.

Staying Abreast Of The Future Of Real Estate

This week I’ve attended a couple of real estate events to help me stay at the forefront of our industry. These events were a real eye-opener and provided a great insight into what’s next for real estate, plus I find that taking the time to do innovative training not only helps to develop my skills and allow me to anticipate and adapt to what’s coming, but, it also improves the level service, certainty and ease that I can provide to my clients.

Our world is changing at a rapid pace and it’s no longer the big that beats the small, it’s the fast that beats the slow.

Which is why I much prefer to anticipate the market and plan for what’s coming so that I can be more of an innovative agent rather than sitting back waiting to see what happens and then ending up wondering what just happened, because I know that in the end if I don’t stay in tune, it impacts upon how I can best serve my clients.

One thing’s for certain there are lots of changes on their way for the acreage market in the years ahead and I’ll be doing my best stay abreast of these changes.

Now, lastly, just before I go, it’s now official that this latest edition of The Acreage Report 2020 (Summer edition) is the most popular edition we’ve released to date.

So, if you haven't already grabbed yourself a copy, make sure you check it out right now at www.TheAcreageReport.com.au to download your FREE copy.

It's packed full of valuable insights and updates about exactly what's happening within the Hawkesbury, Hills & Sydney’s North West acreage market, plus when you grab a copy you’ll also receive instant access to The McGrath Report 2020 which features some great information from property expert, John McGrath.

So there you have it, that’s it for this week’s Acreage Market Wrap.

If you’ve got any questions about anything I’ve shared this week or would like to discuss any of your acreage plans with me, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Thanks for watching.

Regards

Greg Vincent