Market Update: The Latest on Land, Prices & Why Time is Money
Hello and welcome back! It’s been a little while since our last podcast episode, but we’re back to our weekly schedule, and I’m excited to give you an update on everything that’s been happening behind the scenes. In this post, I’ll cover some big changes within our team, the current state of the property market, and why finding land is one of the biggest challenges right now.
Over the past few months, we’ve seen massive growth in our team and business. We’ve welcomed two new building brokers, Jake and Mim, which has been a huge milestone for us. For a long time, it was just me, and then Maddie joined over a year ago. Now, with a growing team, the energy in the office is incredible! The training process has been full-on, but now that everyone is settling into their roles, we’re excited to continue helping clients navigate their home-building journey.
Personally, I also moved house, which—if you’ve ever moved—comes with its own set of challenges. But it’s been great to finally be settled in. With all of this going on, the podcast took a temporary backseat, but now that things have stabilized, we’re back and ready to bring you fresh insights every week.
Right now, one of the biggest challenges in the industry is securing land. We’re seeing a significant shortage of titled land, which means developers and estates can’t keep up with the demand. This supply-and-demand imbalance is making land releases highly competitive, with many estates releasing just 7-8 blocks at a time. To put this into perspective, there are often 50-100 buyers waiting for those few available blocks.
A perfect example: We recently had a client participate in an expression of interest release. They submitted their form the second it opened, and still weren’t first in line. The land agent later told us that over 100 applications were submitted within minutes!
Despite these challenges, our team has successfully secured 12 blocks in the last six weeks—which, in this market, is a massive achievement. Having a building broker on your side is more valuable than ever, as we have strong relationships with developers and land agents, and we stay on top of release schedules to give our clients the best shot at securing a block.
A major takeaway from the current market is that waiting can cost you significantly. Land prices are increasing with each new release, and build prices continue to rise every month. Here’s a real-life example:
This example highlights why it’s so important to act when you find a block and a package that fits your budget. The longer you wait, the more expensive your build will become—not just because of builder price increases, but also because land prices are rising at an even faster rate.
Another challenge in the current market is the $600,000 price cap for the First Home Guarantee Scheme. While this scheme is fantastic for first-home buyers with lower deposits, the reality is that $600K doesn’t go as far as it used to.
This means that buyers looking to take advantage of the scheme need to either compromise on location or opt for a smaller home to stay within the cap. While this can be frustrating, the key takeaway is that getting into the market now—even with a smaller home—puts you in a stronger financial position down the track.
If you’ve been considering an established home instead of building, you’re likely seeing the same challenges. Houses are selling in just eight days on average, and competition is fierce, with 50-80 buyers per home in some cases. The rental market is also tight, pushing more people to explore buying options, which only adds to the demand for land and new builds.
The market is competitive, but the key to success is making informed and efficient decisions. If you find a block that fits your needs, don’t hesitate. Work with professionals who understand the industry, ask the right questions, and help you navigate the process effectively.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be covering more topics, including:
If you’re thinking about getting into the market but don’t know where to start, book a discovery call with our team. We’d love to help you create a plan and secure your home before prices climb even further.
See you next week for another episode!
Need help navigating the market? Book a discovery call with us today!
Welcome to Home Building Like a Boss, the podcast dedicated to helping first home buyers in Perth build their dream home with ease and excitement. I’m Jaimi, your host and go to building broker. Are you ready to feel empowered, in control and excited about your building journey? I’ll help guide you with expert advice, insider tips and tricks and real life stories to help you navigate the confusing world of home building.
Tune in as I take you on the journey to building your home like a boss. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of the podcast. I have had a bit of a break from recording. There’s been lots going on over the last couple of months. So I do apologize that there hasn’t been any new episodes, but we’re going to get back on it to our weekly episodes and give you a little update on what’s been happening behind the scenes with the company.
We’ve had lots of changes and lots of growth, which has been very exciting and also give you a little bit of a market.
So I guess, first off, yeah, it’s been a crazy couple of months behind the scenes, we personally, I mean, I moved house. So moving house is always crazy and challenging times. So that was. Good, but it’s so nice to be in my new place and we have expanded and grown the team, which if you follow us on Instagram, you would have seen all of our new team updates, which has been really exciting.
So I’ve spent lots of time with Jake and Mim, who are our two new building brokers. Lots of time training them and building the team and working on our clients and. Lots of bits and pieces that the podcast just fell off on the bottom of the to do list, but now slowly getting back into it now that they’re on their feet and getting their groove.
It’s been really good in the office. You know, it’s been me working on my own for the last couple of years and Maddie over the last 12 months. So it’s so nice and so much fun in the office now having Jake and Mim in. So yeah, it’s been really good and very exciting on the business front. And we’ve got so many new clients coming through, which has also been super exciting.
So we’ve just been working hard on supporting our clients and helping them find land and their builder, which finding the land at the moment has also been, that’s like a huge challenge across the industry at the moment, which I’ll dive into when we get into our updates on generally how the market has been doing, but lots of super exciting episodes coming for you over the next.
Next couple of weeks and like ongoing, but definitely lots of topics that have come up consistently on challenges and struggles and questions that our clients have been having going to turn quite a lot of them into episodes, get some more clients on and possibly get the team on for a podcast episode as well.
So I’m going to get into it now on our general market update of what’s been happening. So like I said before, at the moment across the grounds, land is probably one of the biggest challenges across the industry at the moment. So a lot of people are struggling that with the established market still, that still hasn’t really changed too much, but because the established market is so tough, a lot of people are turning towards building now as well, which is great.
And the struggle is and the challenge is across the board at the moment is developers and estates can’t keep up with how the requirements that are needed for blocks. So essentially the supply and the demand, which I would have gone over in previous episodes, the supply and the demand. So it works very similar to.
Building and same as the established market, when we look at it as the land market, demand is higher than what the supply is. And the developers can’t keep up with the production of developing new estates and getting blocks quick enough on where the demand is. So essentially then that’s causing a supply and demand issue, which is then driving up prices.
There’s less blocks coming on the market. The releases with, um, blocks and estates and land agents rather than estates releasing 20 or 30 blocks, they’re releasing seven or eight every couple of weeks. So at seven and eight, there’s. You know, 50 to a hundred people waiting for those seven to eight blocks.
So it’s been challenging in a sense, but we’ve had quite a great result as a teams, we’ve really put our brains together and our minds together, and we’ve got great relationships with developers and land agents that we’ve been able to secure quite a lot of blocks for our clients, which has been really amazing and essentially that takes up quite a lot of our time at the moment.
With finding blocks of land for our clients. So, you know, the podcast just fell off the bottom of the list, but now back recording episodes again, which will be really good. We finding land is, you know, that challenging, challenging part at the moment. I know we had a client who got a block in Alkimos. And that was by expression of interest, which is released at a certain time.
You have to fill out a form as, as the client and that form gets timestamped. And wherever you get timestamped to say, you know, what block that you might get. And our clients did it. I think it was like bang on the dot submitted at like 10 Oh one when it got released at 10 and they were. I can’t remember how far in the line, they weren’t right at the start of the line, but they weren’t at the end of the line and they got secured on a block and the land agent had said there was a hundred applicants that submitted for, through that form to secure a block.
So it is pretty crazy out there. There’s all with that supply and demand. But, you know, I celebrate the team. We’ve got quite a really good result over the last six weeks. We’ve secured about 12 blocks, which is about two a week. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot. In this market, that is a lot. And, you know, that’s one of the benefits of having a building broker helping you through that.
Finding land at the moment is 90 percent of our work. And if, you know, you’re not available because you’re at work or you’re doing things for the release or The times you’ve gotta be on it when the land gets released. Otherwise they’re gone. Like estates and blocks are selling out within 10 minutes, half an hour.
So you’ve gotta be on it and you’ve gotta be ready to buy and make a decision. So it always comes down to that effective but concise decision making. Like you don’t have time to sit on it and ponder and put a hold on it anymore. You’ve gotta make that effective but efficient decision making if you’ve got a block in this market.
You’ve got to run with it, obviously in the area, in the size, in the budget, all those things come into play. And especially at the moment, which I’m going to do another episode on one of our other clients who just secured a block on how much the blocks like each release is getting more expensive because the demand is so crazy and the supply is so little.
The prices on blocks are going up. So not only is it build prices moving every month, land prices are moving every week. So, and that comes back to time as money, which circle back to one of my previous episodes where I’m going over time as money that is happening. And that is so important now more than ever on how you’re waiting or different releases, different blocks, different builders, waiting a couple of months, waiting different releases that is adding more and more.
I’m going to be talking about the first time guarantee scheme. And it’s a different scheme because it’s a more money because you’re waiting more time. So there’s lots of variables and factors that are happening at the moment across the market. And you know, one of the other challenges that I would say is the first time guarantee scheme with the 600, 000 cap.
It depends on what a state and how much you spend on your block of land, but 600 K for house and land package at the moment. is not actually a lot and that all comes down to the median house price. You know, if we look at the median house price for a three bedroom is 580 and the median house price for a four bedroom, these are all off Rewa, is 710, 000.
So, You know, those first home guarantee scheme under the 600 cap, you’ve really got to pick a cheaper location. And you’re looking at more sort of a three by two to work within that budget, which is restricting quite a lot of clients and the expectations and what they’re wanting to get in the market, all about getting your foot in the door to spend time in the market.
To then be eligible to get your property in five, 10, however many years it is later. 600 K is very different from a couple of years ago. And I think it’s all about adjusting to that new norm and expectations and reality about how much land costs and how much building costs and how quickly everything is continuing to move, which is continuing to go up.
And it just goes to show like how much. Even in the last 12 months, things have changed. You know, at the moment off Rewa, the number of houses, units and land sold in the last week was 3, 251. And if we look at that the same week as last year, it was 5, 051. So that is a huge difference. And that’s between houses, units and land.
That is a huge shift in stock levels across all three of those. And the median house is selling in an average of eight days at the moment on the market. So houses and establish are not on the market for long, you know, I, and this goes back, I sold my house in January and there was 80 people that came through, there were offers left, right, and center.
There is, people are trying, there’s a lot of people wanting those prices and there is a lot of people wanting houses. And needing houses, people moving to Perth, people getting out of rentals, people moving out of their homes, all those things are driving the supply and the demand is so low. So, you know, you’re competing with 50 to 80 and it’s essentially a seller’s market.
So it’s very, very. Very competitive and that, you know, hasn’t changed and that’s gotten probably even more competitive, um, than it was 12 months ago. So this kind of gives you a little, you know, recap and just a little update on where we’re at, where I’ve been, what I’ve been doing, which, yeah, been spending lots of time with the team, training, looking after clients, which has been really fun and really nice.
So it’s been, yeah, really, really good. Been looking for land, lots of updates. So yeah, been looking for, you know, lots of land. We’ve been doing lots of sketch and cost requests coming through and supporting them and supporting clients. And it just kind of gives you a little bit of an overview on where the market’s at and what’s happening, but we’ll have lots of different topics and things come through, you know, I’m going to chat about different prices, um, blocks, availability, have some special guests on the show.
And we’ll be back each week with some more episodes. So thank you for listening and I’ll talk to you next week.
Thank you so much for tuning in to the home building like a boss podcast. I hope you enjoyed today’s episode and learned something new. Remember you’ve got this and I’ve got your back until next time. Stay inspired, stay informed, and stay confident on your building journey. I can’t wait to chat with you on the next episode.
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