A massive electoral showdown in the USA is looming in November, with Donald Trump aiming to do his best to unseat the Democrats and take the reigns once again.
If property searches are anything to go by, the uncertainty in the US is causing many people to look at other places to live. A surprising… or maybe not so surprising… benefactor looks to be Australian property, if a recent Proptrack report is anything to go by.
We love good, solid data at The Henry Wong Team®, so let’s take a look at some of the stats the Proptrack team put together.
US Property Searches by the Numbers
This figure is pretty hard to believe, but in July the number of searches in the US to buy Australian property surged by 51%. That’s a massive jump, about which PropTrack analyst Karen Dellow says the following:
“It is common to see a spike in both rent and buy searches from overseas when there is political or economic turmoil in other countries. The increase in searches from the United States came at the time when polls suggested Donald Trump was favoured to win the election.”
And what area of Australia are most of the American searches targeting? First is Brisbane, closely followed by the Greater Brisbane region.
It’s going to be interesting to see whether a new Democratic candidate has any effect on this, and how the actual election results will influence the migration of US residents to Australia. Watch this space.
The US isn’t the only country with a renewed interest in Australia though…
Other International Interest
There was a 9% month-to-month increase in international property searches targeting Australia. While most of these came from the US, there was still significant interest from other countries. Let’s see where these countries are and what areas in Australia they’re looking at:
The United Kingdom: Buyer searches from the UK were up 15.7% in July, with searches to rent up 7.5%. Could this also be a by-product of economic and political turmoil in the UK? Quite possibly. The Greater Brisbane Region is top of the hit list for UK searches.
New Zealand: Another surge in searches, this time one of 9.5% for Kiwis looking at properties for sale in Australia. Their favourite place is the Gold Coast, followed by Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. They love Queensland!
India: There was a 21.8% increase in searches from Indians during July. Their preference is for Melbourne, followed by Sydney and Greater Brisbane.
Singapore: A 19.9% increase in Singaporean searches was largely focused on Perth, which is explained by the proximity of the two regions.
Why Choose Australia?
You’ll notice a strong trend of interest in Brisbane from the above countries, and who can blame them – we have a blissful climate here, as well as a strong and stable local economy and a stable state Government.
What are the factors that cause people to look at Australia as a potential migration destination, to the extent that they begin to research property here?
One factor is the weak Australian dollar, which has recently just hit a four-month low against the US dollar, which gives overseas investors more bang for their buck when they buy in Australia.
There are other factors though, and they include our solid employment statistics and our very high standard of living. We have a strong democracy here and are a peaceful nation with an excellent economy. I mean, who wouldn’t want to live in Australia?!
How Sellers Can Leverage This Interest
If you’re thinking of selling your home and you want to leverage foreign interest, you need a real estate agent who can get your property in front of international buyers. Most local real estate agents only rely on the main real estate portals and fail to get any traction with the overseas market.
At The Henry Wong Team®, we’ve spent years working on growing our international network. It extends far outside of Australia, spreading across the world and having strong inroads into wealthy Asian communities both in Australia and abroad.
They are professionals, colleagues, buyers, friends and investors. They are lawyers, doctors, financial experts, government officials and people from all walks of life. They know us and trust us, so when we list a property, they take notice. And if the property isn’t for them, they refer it to people who they think may be interested.
In this way, we get massive overseas traction on every home we list. This contributes to our nearly flawless clearance rate in auctions, and helps us sell many properties before they go to market.
If you’re thinking of selling, let The Henry Wong Team® put our network to work for you. It’s a surefire way to leverage international interest in Australian property!
