We have just released our latest Secret Agent report.

2018 was quite a turbulent year for real estate, both in Melbourne and many other parts of Australia. Stagnation and negative growth have been touted as being the beginning of a property crash.

This month, Secret Agent will analyse indicators and metrics which affected the Melbourne property market in 2018, including Australian bond yields, auction clearance rates, housing prices, household debt and negative gearing changes. We’ll also discuss how they are likely to affect prices further into 2019.

Access the Reflections on 2018 report now!

Happy New Year! We have just released our latest Secret Agent report.

Moments in history like now, it’s important to take stock and get into the head of Australia’s most important financial person. Head of RBA: Philip Lowe. 

The Royal Commission’s upcoming report into banking is likely to be a huge deal for banks and future lending practices. Risks remain for banks to be heavily wounded from these findings. 

In this report, Secret Agent wanted to look into Mr Philip Lowe’s views on banking crises. 

Access the Philip Lowe’s Perspective on Banking Crises report now!

“Detroit is largely composed, today, of seemingly endless square miles of low-density failure.” – Jane Jacobs

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

A variety of forces affect the real estate market, one of which is zoning controls: local government policies that control the supply of housing in some way. Although they may provide benefits, these controls also push up the price of housing.

In this report, Secret Agent will break down the findings of a recent RBA paper by Ross Kendall and Peter Tulip on the zoning effect.

Access The Zoning Effect report now!

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

The Melbourne Metro tunnel is an initiative launched by the Victorian Government in 2015, with construction already underway. The project includes the addition of five new stations connected underground, with an expected completion in 2026.

There are clear benefits to the project, including an increased capacity of 36,000 passengers during peak periods, as well as easing overcrowding of the current city loop and the inner-city tram network.

While the social benefits are clear, the impact this project will have on properties near the construction and eventual completed infrastructure is unknown.

In this report, Secret Agent will investigate; how the construction will affect businesses, prices and buyer sentiment; what the tunnel will mean for new developments such as townhouses and apartment blocks and how the Melbourne Metro compares to other city transport systems such as the Scania region in Sweden and Montreal.

Access the Melbourne Metro: Revisited report now!

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

2017 saw remarkable shifts in how investors pick what to invest in and when.

This month, Secret Agent recaps the year of inner Melbourne property in 2017. We review the performance of houses, townhouses and apartments and highlight the best performing suburbs.

Access the EOY 2017 report now!

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

This month, Secret Agent investigates how a property’s elevation above sea level influences its price.

The suburbs analysed include: Albert Park, Middle Park, Carlton North, Princes Hill, East Melbourne, South Yarra, North Melbourne, Ivanhoe, Eaglemont, Toorak, Essendon and Hawthorn.

Access the Elevation report now!

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

This month, Secret Agent thought it would be interesting to consider foreign ownership in Australia, particularly by migrant and second generation Chinese.

Access The Chinese Effect report now!

We have just released our latest Secret Agent report!

This month, Secret Agent takes a closer look at artificial intelligence, with a focus on property prices in Melbourne. By examining regression and classification methods, we use machine learning to discover trends and patterns in data.

Access the Artificial Intelligence report now!

In Secret Agent’s latest Rent report we took a detailed look into the yield of each inner Melbourne suburb. See Table 1.

An investor should be looking to try and maximise yield when finding a rental property. However, they also need to be mindful of the relationship between yield and risk.

Often a higher yield can mean more risk, such as oversupply.

The higher yield of inner Melbourne (5.3%) reflects the greater risk premium. East Melbourne which offers a tight yield of 3.47% is the ultimate blue chip location, however the yield isn’t too attractive.

Be careful of looking solely at yield to making investment decisions. It’s possible to obtain yields above 10% in remote regional locations, but once a tenant has vacated, it may be a long time before another tenant is discovered.

Over 10,000 cyclists commute into Melbourne’s inner city every morning. Many popular routes are located along residential streets. Secret Agent wanted to find out if the presence of a bicycle lane had any impact on house sale prices within a suburb.  Read the full post