Spring has long been considered the peak season for real estate, but early indications suggest momentum may build more slowly this year.

Listing volumes – and buyer activity - traditionally grow as we move out of winter.

However, speculation around the long-term economic impact of COVID-19 appears to have created hesitation among some vendors, resulting in a relative sparsity of listings in Adelaide.

That’s supported by latest data from property market analyst Core Logic.

Their research showed new listing levels here were down 17.7 per cent from the same period last year, while the number of total listings had dropped 21.9 per cent.

Adelaide’s total listing numbers were relatively consistent with national figures, where a 17.7 per cent decline was recorded across all capital cities. That included an 8.6 per cent slump in total listings nationally in the four weeks to September 6.

New listings were also down 25.3 per cent in the capital cities, though that was skewed significantly by a 76.1 per cent drop in fresh listings in Melbourne due to the coronavirus lockdown.

With listings down, Core Logic modelling estimated that national settled sales have bounced back since April. They were more subdued in recent months, however, including a 1.9 per cent drop in August.

Local figures were slightly weaker, too, with sales volumes in Adelaide showing an annual decrease of 2.6 per cent. Hobart is the only other capital city to register a drop in sales year-on-year, recording a 13 per cent decline.

Consumer confidence also fell 9.5 per cent through August, in line with the declining sales volume.

At Toop&Toop, however, our sales numbers have been very solid, and we’ve certainly seen an incremental increase in attendance numbers at weekend property inspections over the first weeks of Spring.

Our team sold more than 50 properties in August after welcoming more than 3000 groups through open inspections. Of those attendees, 38 per cent were new to our database.

Our online traffic data remained buoyant, too. Our properties were viewed more than 4.5 million times on realestate.com.au, while there were almost 100,000 virtual property inspection on the Toop website.

While sales and listing volumes in Adelaide have declined in recent months, dwelling values have remained very steady.

There was no statistical value change to Adelaide property through August, following a quarterly drop of just 0.1 per cent. Dwelling values locally remain 2.7 per cent up over the past year and still sit just 0.1 per cent below May 2020’s record high.

By comparison, dwelling values dropped 2.1 per cent across all capital cities in the three months to August, including 3.5 per cent and 2.1 per cent decreases in Melbourne and Sydney respectively.

Having said that, the risk of negative equity has reduced thanks to broader growth from mid-2019. Despite recent drops, national dwelling values remain 5.8 per cent higher over the year to August.

While there is potential for increased activity as we move deeper into Spring, there’s no evidence to suggest Adelaide dwelling values will dip in the short-term.

Because of that, we would recommend that buyers consider pursuing suitable existing listings, rather than relying on fresh stock hitting the market.