Up here in Brisbane there’s a real buzz in the real estate industry, but down in Victoria things are dead. According to The Sunday Age newspaper, property sales have dropped from 2032 in the first four weeks of August 2007 to 1131 for the same period this year.
Maybe the forecast cut in interest rates, the first in 7 years, will help kick things along. During the March quarter of 2008, households were spending 38 per cent of their incomes on mortgage payments. Then there’s the rising cost of fuel, which has also gone through the roof this year, making things pretty tough on Kevin Rudd’s “working families”. Not to mention “working real estate agents”.
In The Age article, CEO of the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, Enzo Raimondo, says that “the downturn may even put some real estate agents out of business.” I can tell you that’s already happened. I know of a few estate agents who have been forced out, and I also know of one entire real estate office, a franchise of one of the big name players, who will be closing their doors very shortly.