Australian Property News

Darwin to pick up next year

Posted on Tuesday, September 21 2010 at 12:14 PM

Darwin doesn’t seem to be the most happening place for residential property at the moment but that’s expected to change next year.

Peterson’s Property Search director Tod Peterson says it’s somewhat of a buyers’ market in Darwin at the moment; the market has slowed with fewer buyers, properties aren’t moving as quickly and with more supply, vendors aren’t in a strong position.

The Darwin market pretty much fell off at the end of last year after having a great run for around six years, says Peterson, and now it’s pretty much plateaued.

While the middle market at around $500,000 to $650,000 is doing okay, he points out that there’s also an oversupply of units in the city, especially top-end units.

The current scenario for the Darwin residential property market is likely to continue right through to next year, says Peterson.

He notes that Japanese energy company Inpex is expected to be making a final investment decision about its liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant near Darwin towards the end of next year and all hopes are riding on that.

There was a lot of anticipation about the project last year, Peterson notes, but the investment decision was put off and that caused the property market to flatten somewhat.

“It will definitely go ahead, it’s just a question of when,” he says. “And when it does it will change the face of Darwin.”

Once the Inpex LNG plant is up and running, Peterson believes it will have a domino effect, attracting other big companies to the area, and creating further stimulus to the market.

December or January is probably a good time for property investors to look at buying in Darwin, says Peterson, because that’s when it’s a bit of a ghost town and people who haven’t been able to offload property might be willing to negotiate.

He doesn’t think the first or second quarter of 2011 will be particularly fantastic for the property market, but he thinks it will take off in the second half of next year.