The WA suburbs where houses are lingering on the market

Perth houses are taking longer to sell, with the average property staying on the market for a period of 37 days – the highest in two years.

The latest figure from Domain shows a significant increase in October compared to just 26 days this time last year, putting Perth ahead of Sydney and Canberra for the biggest increase in time spent on the market.

However, WA properties still spend the least amount of time on the market compared to other states and territories.

Domain senior economist Joel Bowman said he believed the reason behind the increase in days on the market was due to buyers being more cautious with their purchases.

“Affordability constraints have become a little more binding, and we have also seen that play out through a slowdown in annual house price growth,” he said.

“It has slowed down about 24 per cent in the September quarter last year to around 10 per cent in the September quarter for this year.”

“So the market is still strong, but it’s not rising at those breakneck speeds that we saw over the last couple of years.

“Houses were previously being snatched up in less than 25 days last year so it is slowly unwinding from that pace.”

Hobart and Darwin both saw a fall in the number of days a property spent on the market, with the figure for houses in Tasmania dropping from 82 to 71 and properties in the Northern Territory shifting from 138 down to 98.

Adelaide also saw a drop of one day from 63 down to 62.

The average property in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Brisbane all recorded increases in days on the market.

“Overall, I think Perth is still running quite a strong market, just less so than the breakneck speeds that we saw a couple of years ago,” Bowman said.

“I think that is a good thing because the double-digit house price growth is unsustainable and the unwinding that we’re seeing in the days on market is certainly not due to more supply coming online.

“I think affordability constraints are really starting to become more binding, but in saying that the buyer demand and interest is still quite strong.

“Especially with the expansion of the home guarantee scheme, I suspect that strong momentum in the market is likely to continue next year as well.”