Townsville Market Up Date
The Townsville market was the biggest mover of the quarter, although this is very much expected with the floods removing a significant proportion of the rental stock. This market moved from a weak 4.3 per cent to a very tight 1.5 per cent.
It’s important to understand that the market was steadily tightening before the floods occurred. The vacancy rate peaked at 7.1 per cent in the September 2016 quarter and since then has been trending downwards. As a result of this tightening market we were already starting to see rents push up in late 2018.
Our forecast for the Townsville market is that as rental stock returns to the marketplace, the vacancy rate will ease again, although we wouldn’t be surprised if it stabilises in the healthy range (2.5 per cent to 3.5 per cent) towards the end of the year and into early 2020.
It’s common in these situations that workers stay on and look for new employment once the recovery work comes to an inevitable end.
David Menso
0407 579 455