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MELBOURNE’S HOUSING MARKET TRANSFORMED BY ASIAN INVESTMENT

Thursday June 20th, 2013

City’s residential sector is dominated by overseas investors lured by its universities and business district.

Overseas Asian money is steadily transforming the residential landscape of Melbourne, luring buyers away from the suburbs and into the city.

Since 1990, Melbourne’s skyline has added 28 residential skyscrapers, each with more than 30 floors, and most built by Australian developers.

And yet since 2009, overseas developers have aggressively taken hold of the city’s property market.

Prices are at record highs. “For the Chinese, it’s only just the start,” he says, predicting they will soon be the dominant group buying land for residential development in the central business district (CBD).

Melbourne has been ranked the “world’s most liveable city” for the past two years by the Economist Intelligence Unit. The survey also notes that Melbourne is a “safe haven” for the current wave of overseas investors, who see huge numbers of Asians in a lively inner city with tree-lined boulevards and green spaces. Plus, prices are still below those of other blue-chip markets, such as Hong Kong and Singapore.

Asian investors are also looking to buy property beyond the CBD. After a 15-month lull, prices are beginning to rise. In Toorak, the area’s most expensive suburb and 5km southeast of the CBD, property agents point to a huge influx of Chinese investors eager to send their children to elite schools nearby, such as Scotch College.

Source: Financial Times

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