According to research by Domain, rental vacancy has fallen sharply in recent months and in Melbourne Vacancy rates have fallen below 2 %. The tightening of the rental market is causing market rents to rise which has been the experience within our rental business.

The rise in rents and tightening of supply will put further pressure on house prices as investors are attracted back into the market to compete with home buyers

· The first month of open international borders and all domestic borders has strengthened pressure on an already strained rental market.

• All capital cities are now operating in a landlords’ market
• Sydney’s vacancy rate is sitting at 1.4%.
• Melbourne continues its sharp recovery from the pandemic-induced spike, falling further this month to 1.8%, the lowest vacancy rate since March 2020.
• Canberra and Perth remain at an all-time low, 0.5%.
• In March, Adelaide was the city with the lowest vacancy rate ever to be recorded across any capital city since records began in 2017 at 0.2%.

The national vacancy rate is now at 1.0%, continuing to trend downward and the third consecutive month to record a decline. This is the lowest rate seen since Domain records began in 2017. The rental market continues to move further in favour of landlords, again driven by a decline in the number of vacant rental listings across most of the capital cities, falling significantly below March 2020 levels, before the pandemic caused a significant spike in vacant rentals.