Preferred Real Estate

The property market in Australia, similar to other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States is struggling to know where it will turn in 2010. Many predict an increase in property prices of more than 5% and other experts predict a drop of more 20% or more.

The main determining factor that will affect property prices will be unemployment. If the unemployment rate continues to rise then it will be only people with deposits that can afford to buy real estate and new builds and many predict that the unemployment rate will soar to as high as 8%, compared to 2008 when the unemployment rate was 4.5%.

The Reserve Bank of Australia cut interest rates by a huge 3% back in 2008 which helped many people with mortgage repayments and the new strict lending rules, issued by the Australian Government, cut down the amount of mortgages given to people who would struggle to meet the repayments.

The amount of repossessions coming onto the market has also been cut down due to these strict lending rules which have enabled the market to remain stable throughout the last few years.