Sydney home values down 10.1%

Oksana Patron

25 October 2022

The Sydney home values have dropped -10.1%, or an equivalent of approximately $116,500, since its peak value in February 2022 driven down by six successive cash rate hikes and record-low affordability, according to CoreLogic’s daily home value index.

Sydney, which was leading the capital cities in the current downtown as it had the country’s most expensive housing market, had arguably the greatest susceptibility to rising interest rates, according to CoreLogic’s research director, Tim Lawless.

“Although Sydney’s housing values were already in decline when the rate hiking cycle began, the pace of decline accelerated sharply following the first interest rate increase in May. Sydney values are now down –9.5% since 3 May, and -10.1% since peaking on 13 February this year,” he said.

However, Sydney home values still would have a way to go before wiping out the capital gains accrued over the recent growth cycle and home values would need to fall a further -11.4% to get back to the levels seen at the onset of COVID, according to CoreLogic.

Melbourne, which was second to Sydney in terms of housing values, saw the market go down -6.4% since January 2022 while Brisbane’s housing market value dropped -6.1% since its peak in June 2022.

Following this, Adelaide and Perth both declines less than -1% since their August peaks.

At the same time, Hobart and Canberra were down -4.7% and -4.4%, respectively, since their month-end peaks while Darwin remained the only capital city with stable housing value although it remained -10.1% below its record high registered in 2014.

“The good news for Sydney home owners is that the rate of decline has continued to moderate through October, improving from a -2.2% decline over the four-week period ending 3 September to – 1.3% over the most recent four-week period ending 23 October,” Lawless noted.