Ever week, amongst all of the crap and junk mail that gets posted through our letter box, we also get a real estate paper which provides details of houses for sale in the local area and a small blurb from the ‘industry’ detailing the current state of the local housing market.

This week’s headline reads:

“Perth weekly rents will continue to surge despite changes to the letting fee”

As I mentioned last week, the letting fee now has to be paid by the landlord of the property and not by the tenant, the idea being that this small reduction in costs will help those on lower incomes. It seems that it’s not really making any real difference though.

Apparently, rental prices have historically dragged behind the growth of the average house price which means we are soon going to be in for a major market correction in relation to rents.

Some mad stats:

During the past twenty years, the average house price in Perth has increased by a whopping 718% to $450,000.

In the same twenty years the average weekly rent for a house in Perth has increased by a slightly more modest 154.9% to $260.00 (Hop on over to XE.com for some up to date conversions )

So, what does this mean for you and me?

Well, with a vacancy rate of less then 1% it’s looking likely that rents will continue to rise and tenants like us will be forced to pay out even more dosh to rent a home.

Perhaps it might be time to buy somewhere sooner rather then later?