Well, further good news for Victoria, of course, this week, on Sunday the Premier announced a further easing of restrictions, which is great news. And as I record this we've had 10 straight days of 0 deaths and 0 new infections, which is just wonderful for everybody.

Good news on the real estate front

On the real estate front, we've had some good news also, we can now have up to 10 people attend an inspection at the same time, and those 10 people can be from different households, so that's going to make it much easier for us to get all the buyers through who are interested in inspecting homes at the moment. It's still not an open for inspection, so you need to make an appointment with your agent and turn up at the allotted time to inspect, but you can inspect along with other people at the same time. As far as auctions go there's no change there. So that means that we are still limited to 10 people per auction at this stage onsite. We can have more people bidding online of course. That may change on November 22nd but we'll have to wait and see on that front. And of course, the other bit of good news was the abolition of the "Ring of Steel" and that now means that metropolitan buyers can go and inspect regional properties and vice versa, so that's great news for everyone right across the real estate industry.

Routine inspections of rental properties now allowed

We also had some really good news on the property management front, we're now able to resume routine inspections of properties. So for all the investors out there, if you haven't seen a report on your property for many months, or even longer in some cases, we're now able to get back on to the property and do those reports for you. And for both landlords and tenants alike there's good news, and that is that we're able to resume routine, non-urgent maintenance and repairs as of this week. So again, great news for everyone in the property management sector.

Market activity remains high

Well, the last couple of weeks have seen a lot of activity right across the Melbourne and Victorian real estate market. Of course last week we had a drop in the official interest rate so that's given even further confidence to the market. We're also seeing an increase in the number of properties coming to auction, but the auction clearance rate is remaining very high, it's over 80%, and that indicates a really strong market. We're also seeing lots of properties continue to be sold prior to auction or off-market so if you're looking to buy I'd certainly encourage you to keep talking to your real estate agents and stay close to them so that you don't miss out on a property that might be suitable for you. Across the Barry Plant Group, we've seen some really strong results over the past week or so, so let me share a couple of those with you now.

Examples of really strong results

We all know the Mornington Peninsula has been attracting a lot of interest lately, and we saw a great example of that at 34 Nixon Street in Rosebud where, after 59 enquiries and 31 private inspections, the home sold in less than a week, for $35,000 above the asking price. In Melbourne's Bayside closer to the city, we had a two-bedroom unit at Warrigal Road in Cheltenham that had 65 inspections, 12 registered bidders and after some spirited competition, it sailed $61,000 past the reserve price to sell for $531,000. And finally, on the other side of the city, at 37 Banchory Avenue, Hillside we saw a four-bedroom family home that attracted five bidders and with an opening bid of $690,000, it quickly passed the reserve price of $720,000 and finally sold for $810,000, some $90,000 above the reserve price. We're seeing some really strong results out there right across the Barry Plant network and whilst we're seeing more properties come onto the market, we're still not seeing enough properties to meet the demand that we're currently experiencing.

If you're thinking of selling your property contact your nearest Barry Plant office for a free, no-obligation appraisal. And don't forget our offer to include your property in our exclusive weekly advertising in the Saturday Herald Sun which is distributed right across Victoria for only $75 plus GST.