Canberra apartment prices continue to rise as housing affordability worsens across the capital, forcing some buyers to stretch their budgets.
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However, one expert says the price surge won't last forever.
According to CoreLogic's December home value index, the median price of a Canberra unit is now $568,308, up 14.7 per cent since this time last year.
At the same time, Canberra's house value growth is cooling, unit values continue to see solid monthly growth. Unit values in the capital grew 2.1 per cent in November, compared to the national average of 0.9 per cent.
Sarah Kapadia and Declan Welsh recently purchased their first home together, a two-bedroom apartment in Kingston, after a year-long search.
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They've experienced Canberra's rising apartment prices first-hand and said they're relieved to finally be in the market.
"In the process of the year, our budget probably went up $100,000 above what we were expecting we'd have to pay to get a decent place," Ms Kapadia said.
"We were getting to the point where we felt like we just had to get in [the market] while we could."
Aliza Cole of Instyle Estate Agents Canberra, who sold the apartment to Ms Kapadia and Mr Welsh, said she has seen a level of frustration among buyers who just want to secure a property.
"I'm finding that people are over it, so they're willing to put in a top offer because they just don't want to be outbid anymore," she said.
Since the couple purchased the apartment, prices have continued to increase. Mr Welsh said an unrenovated apartment sold in the same complex for $10,000 more than their renovated apartment did just one month prior.
"We were prepared to be looking for a lot longer and potentially [continue to] rent next year. We're pretty glad we got in when we did," he said.
CoreLogic head of research Eliza Owen said housing affordability constraints are likely to be pushing more buyers into higher density living.
"If we look at median [house] values across Canberra at the moment, they're sitting just a couple of hundred dollars short of the $1 million mark," she said.
"We've seen very strong growth in the house segment, so that's potentially contributing to that reacceleration of growth across the unit market."
In some positive news for hopeful buyers, Ms Owen expects Canberra's rising apartment prices to cool in the New Year.
"At the moment, we're going through a bit of a trend where relatively affordable markets are seeing this kind of reinvigoration in growth rates and that dynamic is definitely clear between Canberra houses and units," she said.
"I think it will be short lived because there are these accumulating headwinds, which would lead to a more broad downswing in the market.
"That includes the fact that mortgage rates appear to have bottomed out and will probably move higher in the next couple of years and higher levels of supply coming into the market."
Ms Kapadia said a slowdown in apartment price growth will be welcome news for other first time buyers.
"Overall we've been pretty lucky, we're both on full-time incomes and were able to push up our budget, I think it's quite scary for people who aren't in the market yet," she said.
Ms Owen said while a cooling of prices is likely, the timing is uncertain.
"The general consensus of how property market dynamics will play out in the next couple of years is this slowdown in the growth rate for 2022 and potentially a fall in values through 2023, where the RBA is signalling that there would be a cash rate increase and that would put downward pressure on prices," she said.
"I think it's important to remember though, and with the recent spread of the Omicron strain of the coronavirus, it's very hard to predict how the timing of monetary policy is going to play out."
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