Home price falls of 2022 ‘now fully reversed’

The Australian property market has recovered all of its 2022 losses, with national home values reaching a new record high in the first month of the busy spring season. New PropTrak data reveals national home values rose by 0.35 percent last month to a median of $754,000.

National prices are up 3.75 percent over the past 12 months, with the combined capital cities recording a stronger rate of growth at 4.76 percent while the combined regions clocked up price gains of 1.28%. PropTrak senior economist Eleanor Creagh said the seasonal increase in the number of homes for sale this spring has done nothing to curtail price growth.

“Despite the uplift in the number of properties coming to market, national home prices have moved higher again, regaining 2022’s rapid price falls in entirety to reach a record high in September,” said Ms Creagh.

“While a sharp increase in the number of properties hitting the market in Sydney and Melbourne has been improving choice for buyers, strong demand has seen prices continue to lift.

“Choice for buyers remains limited in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, heightening competition and seeing prices hit fresh peaks in each of these markets in September.”

Strong buyer competition is keeping auction clearance rates high this Spring. CoreLogic data shows 2,436 capital city homes were taken to auction last weekend, with a preliminary clearance rate of 71 percent recorded. This time last year, the clearance rate was 60.6 percent.

The PropTrak report shows that among the capital city markets, price growth over the past 12 months has been strongest in Perth. Home values have risen 9.24 percent to a record median of $597,000. Adelaide prices are up 8.31 percent to a record median of $689,000, and Sydney prices are up 6.86 percent to a median of $1.057 million.

In the regions, annual growth has been strongest in regional South Australia, where the median price has risen 9.86% to a new peak median of $399,000. Regional Queensland prices are up 4.89 percent to a record $614,000, while regional Western Australia prices have risen 3.29 percent to $460,000. Ms Creagh said prices will continue rising, with the key drivers being record levels of net overseas migration, tight rental markets and an undersupply of housing.

“Looking ahead, interest rates have likely peaked and population growth is rebounding strongly,” she said. “Together with a shortage of new home builds, prices are expected to rise.”

The Federal Government is projecting a net increase of 715,000 migrants over the next two years at a time when Australia already has a housing deficit. The National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation estimates a shortfall of 106,300 homes over the next five years.

In the rental market, Domain chief of research and economics, Dr Nicola Powell said Australia needs 40,000 to 70,000 extra rentals to meet current demand and balance the market.

“That is like adding all of the dwellings in the LGA of Newcastle into the market,” she said.

Domain’s latest Rent Report reveals a record-breaking 10 consecutive quarters of growth in weekly house rents and nine consecutive quarters of growth in weekly apartment rents. CoreLogic data shows the pace of rental price growth is slowing in 2023 but it is still very difficult for tenants to find a rental, with the national vacancy rate now sitting at a record low of 1.1 percent.

For Jack Freeman, a compelling interior should not look as though it was completed in a single shopping trip.

The founder and designer behind FREEMAN & CO prefers rooms that develop through art, travel, commissioned furniture and objects collected over time. It is an approach that treats the home less as a decorative project and more as an evolving portrait of its owner.

“I am a true believer in collecting versus decorating,” Freeman says.

That distinction underpins the international practice he has built across private residences, hotels, property developments, yachts and private aviation. Its projects stretch from Point Piper, Vaucluse, Circular Quay and Toorak to Mayfair, Bel Air and the Caribbean.

Although the locations and architecture vary considerably, the work is connected by a restrained design language. Natural stone, warm timbers and sculptural furniture establish the foundation, while art, bespoke lighting and individual objects give each interior its identity.

The objective is not to overwhelm a room with obvious symbols of expense. It is to create an environment that feels calm, layered and particular to the people living within it.

“The greatest luxury isn’t about excess,” Freeman says. “It’s about creating an oasis where you come home and feel immediately grounded — effortlessly chic and deeply personal.”

Collecting instead of decorating

Decorating can imply the completion of a room: selecting the required furniture, filling the available walls and producing a coherent finished image.

Collecting is less conclusive.

A collected interior has room to change as its owners travel, discover artists, inherit pieces or reassess how they use their home. Its character comes from the relationship between objects rather than adherence to a single brand or season.

That does not mean placing unrelated pieces together without discipline. The designer must understand scale, proportion, material and provenance well enough to create a dialogue between them.

A contemporary artwork might sit beside a historic piece of furniture. A precisely detailed new interior may be interrupted by an irregular object made by hand. Smooth stone can be balanced by timber, textiles or a patinated metal surface that becomes richer with age.

The tension between those elements is part of the appeal.

For Freeman, art is not an accessory to be added once the furniture plan is complete. It forms part of the architecture and atmosphere of the room from the beginning.

Lighting is considered in the same way. Beyond its practical purpose, a bespoke fitting can operate as a suspended sculpture, changing both the room’s composition and the way its materials are experienced after dark.

A design perspective shaped by travel

International travel plays a significant role in Freeman’s creative process.

Design fairs such as PAD Paris and Salone del Mobile in Milan provide opportunities to encounter emerging designers, established galleries, new materials and collectible furniture away from the filter of social media.

More spontaneous discoveries can prove equally important.

“Sometimes it’s the simple things,” Freeman says. “That piece found on a shopping trip with a client in Paris, stumbling across an artisan’s workshop, or a special memory that forms the narrative of the story.”

Objects selected during travel bring more than visual interest into a home. They carry an association with a place, maker or experience, giving the client a connection that cannot be reproduced by ordering an entire interior from a catalogue.

Freeman’s influences are international, but his projects are not conceived as replicas of Parisian, Milanese or Californian style. Each commission responds to its architecture, setting, natural light and the daily lives of its occupants.

A waterfront Sydney residence demands a different treatment from a Mayfair townhouse. A Caribbean estate shaped by brutalist architecture and reflecting pools calls for another response again.

The designer’s role is to absorb those references without allowing them to overwhelm the individual qualities of the property.

Designing the complete experience

FREEMAN & CO extends beyond conventional interior decoration.

The practice’s stated services include interior design and architecture, project management, property acquisition, development advice, concept design, documentation, furniture and lighting design, procurement and art curation.

That breadth allows the team to become involved before a room’s dimensions and finishes are fixed.

Early participation can be important at the top end of the residential market, where architecture, landscape, interiors, technology and art must operate as one environment. Decisions about ceiling heights, wall dimensions, sightlines and lighting can directly affect where art is installed or how custom furniture is proportioned.

The practice can then carry those decisions through to procurement and final installation, maintaining the design narrative as a project moves between architects, builders, specialist craftspeople, dealers and suppliers.

Its residential portfolio includes a South Coast retreat conceived as an escape from urban life, a Caribbean estate with reflecting pools, an East Coast-inspired Palm Beach residence and a Mayfair townhouse organised around an expressive drawing room.

The studio also says it has worked on highly tailored Sydney residences with values exceeding $100 million, although the private nature of such commissions means individual addresses and clients are not always disclosed.

A home that can keep changing

The risk in creating a perfectly resolved interior is that it can become too static — a composition that looks exceptional in photographs but leaves little room for life.

Freeman sees the home as something that should evolve with its owners.

“I love the evolution of design,” he says. “We are talking about people’s lives, and as they evolve, so too should their private sanctuaries.”

That evolution might involve adding art, reupholstering a significant piece, adapting rooms as a family changes or making space for objects gathered through future travels.

The original design needs to be strong enough to accommodate those layers.

This may be the clearest expression of Freeman’s approach to luxury. It is not simply access to rare stone, collectible furniture or commissioned craftsmanship. It is the creation of a personal environment whose meaning deepens rather than diminishes with time.

Fact box

Designer: Jack Freeman

Role: Founder and managing director

Practice: FREEMAN & CO

Base: Australia, with international projects

Project locations named by the practice: Point Piper, Vaucluse, Circular Quay, Toorak, Palm Beach, the NSW South Coast, Mayfair, Bel Air and the Caribbean

Sectors: Private residences, hotels, residential developments, private aviation and superyachts

Services: Interior design and architecture, property development, project management, property acquisition, documentation, furniture and lighting design, FF&E procurement, interior dressing and art curation

Design philosophy: Collected, personal interiors shaped by art, craftsmanship, travel and enduring materials

Website: free-man.co

Home price falls of 2022 ‘now fully reversed’

More stock coming to market has done little to dampen strong outcomes for vendors

Jack Freeman believes the most compelling interiors are not decorated, but collected. The FREEMAN & CO founder creates layered, personal spaces shaped by art, travel and craftsmanship.