Michael is joined by Dr Nicola Powell, Domain’s Senior Research Analyst, regarding property values across Australia falling for the first time since June last year, as the economic impacts of the coronavirus pandemic take a toll on sales.

But Australia’s property market may be in for a softer landing than projected, with the latest CoreLogic Home Value Index, released on Monday, showing the combined value of houses and apartments dropped only 0.4 per cent last month to a national median price of $557,818.

Values fell across five of the eight capital cities in May, dropping 0.9 per cent in Melbourne to a median of $686,798, 0.4 per cent in Sydney to $885,159 and 0.1 per cent in Brisbane to $508,386.

Values also dropped 0.6 per cent in Perth to $443,669 and 1.6 per cent in Darwin to 393,939, however they were up in Adelaide, Canberra and Hobart, which had the largest gain at 0.8 per cent.

Dr Powell says the marginal movement in prices had coincided with the slowdown in transactions and she expected to see continued price weakness in the months ahead.

“It will be sometime before we see transactions at a level that we would expect for this time of year,” Dr Powell said. “We’ve seen a pullback in both sellers and buyer activity which will provide somewhat of a floor to prices.”

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