THIRTY years ago, house prices in Sydney were taking a massive tumble with some properties dropping up to 30 percent in value.
Byron Shire real estate agents, while expecting some impact on the local market, believed it would be nothing like the slump in Sydney.
They said there had been indications of some ‘levelling off’ in prices, but there had been no dramatic falls.
Most agents I spoke to back in 1990 agreed that the residential market was slow, with potential buyers taking a lot more time to make up their minds.
They said that while house prices might be dropping a little because of the of the high interest rate-induced market slow-down, land prices, if anything, were holding their own and in some cases, slowly rising.
Byron Shire Council figures at the time indicated that the number of homes exchanging hands in the shire had dropped by 33 percent in the past year.
Tony Patterson from PRD Realty in Byron Bay said those properties that had dropped in value were considered to be overvalued during the most recent real estate boom.
He said a ‘solid’ home in an old, established area of the town had recently sold for $180,000.
The price was reasonable, he said, but would have been a little more nine months before.
Homes under $150,000 in Byron Bay were a rarity.
There were still ‘lookers’ in the marketplace and houses were selling, but potential buyers were indulging in a lot more comparison shopping than during boom times.
Because of high interest rates, people were taking a lot longer to commit themselves to signing contracts.
Jim Clark from Elders-R Gordon and Son said there might have been some slight downward pressure, but there were always people who wanted to live at Byron Bay. (And it hasn’t changed.)
Mr Clark said a shortage of residential land at Byron Bay kept land prices up.
He said a building block in the town’s Pacific Vista estate had sold for $97,000 and a block at Sunrise Beach had sold for $60,000.
Agents, he said, would have no trouble selling blocks on the planned Baywood Chase subdivision at Suffolk Park, or the planned fourth stage of Sunrise Beach estate. (He was right. We bought a block in Teak Circuit, Baywood Chase all those years ago.)
At Ocean Shores, there were houses selling for under $100,000.
Roger Buck from Buck and Co at Brunswick Heads said home prices in the area were static and vendors would have to be prepared to negotiate on their list price if they wanted to sell.
Gary Knight from the Bangalow Professionals said the market for properties priced between $80,000 to $110,000 was very strong.
HOW different is it today? The median home price at Byron Bay is $1.3 million, close to $ 1 million at Bangalow and $1.1 million at Brunswick Heads.
And home loan interest rates are at an all-time low.
Certainly a long way from the 16.5 percent we were paying in 1990. The overdraft rate was something like 22 percent. Killers.