Rental vacancy rates across Australian capital cities have dropped to a record low. Source: Cyron Ray Macey, Wikimedia Commons
On top of soaring rent prices, over the past couple of months, tenants have been facing record low rental vacancy rates across all of Australia’s major cities.
Low vacancy rates mean renters are facing very tough competition when applying for houses, with single parents, students, and those on low incomes struggling the most.
These conditions have got even worse for renters in the past couple of months.
“Tenants faced even tougher conditions in October, with the proportion of rental properties sitting vacant falling to the lowest level on record,” Prop Track economist Anne Flaherty said.
In Sydney, rental vacancies have fallen to a record low of 1.11 per cent, which is over 60 per cent lower than in March 2020.
Melbourne’s rental vacancy rate has halved compared to the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Brisbane is also seeing a record low vacancy rate of less than 1 per cent.
In Perth, the situation is even harder, with a rental vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent in October.
But Hobart reported the biggest drop in its available properties, coming to 0.18 per cent, however, it is still the second easiest Australian city to find a rental property.
Darwin and Adelaide, however, saw a slight increase, with Darwin’s vacancy rate rising from 0.68 per cent to nearly 2.5 per cent.
Flaherty said rental vacancy rates have been going down for over three years now, and that they are likely to continue to decrease.
