Bendigo Rental Market Update

Low vacancy rates across regional Victoria continue on with little light at the end of tunnel for renters with rates falling to just under one per cent in May, a sixteen-year record low.

The main reasons for the current record low rates and rising rents around Victoria is due to investors selling their rental properties to homeowners over the past two years because of rising house prices, and also the State Governments new policies on Essential Safety Checks driving the cost of owning an investment property a less attractive option. The higher scarcity of rentals and the costs associated to owning a rental both big factors to why rental prices have increased.    

The rental vacancy rate in central Bendigo is a wafer-thin 0.9 per cent, while Greater Bendigo rents rose 10.5 per cent over the past year to a median $420 per week.

Tenants who try looking further afield may have no more luck, as the vacancy rate is just 0.5 per cent in the nearby region of Heathcote-Castlemaine-Kyneton, and in Loddon-Elmore it is 0.2 per cent.

The issue is widespread in regional Victoria. Geelong rents are 5.9 per cent more expensive than a year ago and the vacancy rate in central Geelong is 0.7 per cent. Ballarat’s vacancy rate is also at 0.7 per cent and rent has increased 5.6 per cent in a year.

Nathan Diss

Director

Property Plus Real Estate