Hong Kong and mainland China-based buyers are snapping up residential units in Australia despite elevated interest rates and surging home prices Down Under, according to agents.
Average home prices in some major Australian cities rose by about 1 per cent month on month in October, according to CoreLogic, a property data services provider in Australia and New Zealand.
In some cities such as Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide prices are at a record-high, having increased by as much as 11 per cent over the past 12 months, said Daniel Ho, co-founder and group managing director of property listing portal Juwai IQI.
The surge in home prices comes despite Australia’s central bank this month hiking interest rates by 25 basis points to control inflation that continues to trend higher than the target annual rate of between 2 per cent and 3 per cent. The interest rate now stands at 4.25 per cent, a 12-year high.
However, foreign buyers, including those from Hong Kong and mainland China, have shrugged off the rate increases to pile into
Australian property.
Recently, a buyer from Hong Kong paid A$3.8 million (US$2.5 million) for a four-bedroom flat in Sydney, said Peter Li, general manager of Plus Agency, a property agency with more than A$200 million in annual sales.
Another Chinese buyer paid A$3 million for a custom-tailored duplex in a suburb in Sydney, Li said.
Other agents have reported similar upswings in overseas buying sentiment, after the Australian government approved 40 per cent more foreign homebuyers in the third quarter from a year earlier. Buyers from mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Vietnam top the list, they said.
