Population data recently released by the ABS for the Year to March 2012, show Western Australia’s population growing at 3.1 per cent or 73,300 people.
This is the highest recorded annual increase and level with the Year to December 2008.
This figure is driven by a record quarterly increase in WA’s population of 23,300 and is part of a renewed surge in our population since late 2010 when the annual growth rate had dropped to 2.2 per cent or just over 49,000 people.
While this particular data is now six months old, REIWA’s ongoing weekly monitoring of properties available for lease suggests the strong growth trend remains, but we will be in a better position to confirm this in another six months.
The trend since December 2010 is that WA is taking a larger share of the overseas migrant intake which hit a record quarterly rise of 14,800 people, the highest since quarterly records have been published since June 1981.
This took the annual migrant increase to 43,760 which is some 4,500 fewer people than the peak inflow which occurred in the Year to December 2008.
Despite a lesser overseas intake for the current Year to March, WA has experienced additional growth from an increase in interstate migrants, up by 3,300 people for the quarter and 9,900 for the year. These are both record figures.
The upshot of all this latest data confirms the pressure that rental markets are experiencing right across the state, given that the rental market is usually the first port-of-call for a majority of migrants looking for somewhere to live.
The critical difference between the population surge in late 2008 and more recently, is that housing supply is now much tighter than it was four years ago.
The strong population growth experienced in 2008 had the benefit of an excess of housing stock following the over-build by developers during the height of the boom years of 2006-07, and which contributed, in part, to the rise in the rental vacancy rate of 4.7 per cent in 2009.
The market has since absorbed that excess stock and there is a much lower level of new construction activity since the end of the First Home Owners Grant Boost in December 2009.
The FHOGB was a monetary response by the Commonwealth to the GFC and was designed to stimulate building.
Housing supply is much tighter now. If the latest surge in population continues it is sure to place continued pressure on the rental market.
This article was originally published on reiwa.com.