The Australian locations where homeowners are selling at a loss

Loss-making resales of homes and investment properties held for less than three years are on the rise, indicating more stress in the marketplace amid high interest rates and the cost-of-living crisis. CoreLogic data shows that of the 86,000 resales during the third quarter of 2023, 6.6 percent were sold at a loss after less than three years of ownership. This is up from 3.6 percent in the September quarter of 2022 and represents a 10-year high, according to CoreLogic’s head of research, Eliza Owen.

Properties held for three years or less represented one in five of all loss-making resales, according to the report. These types of sales were seen in many markets across the country. However, the areas recording the highest portion of these sales were Melbourne–Inner at 4.1 percent, Melbourne–West at 3.7 percent and Sydney’s Central Coast at 3.6 percent. The median loss for these resales was $30,000.

Most of the loss-making resales among properties held for less than three years were houses, at 64.8 percent. Ms Owen said this was quite a different trend to all loss-making resales across all tenure periods. On that broader basis, more of the overall loss-making resales were apartments at 70.9 percent.

It is a commonly held view among property experts that real estate must be held over the long term to achieve strong capital growth. This is partly because property prices typically move in cycles that can take several years to complete. Property is also an asset class that involves high entry and exit costs such as stamp duty, legal fees, marketing costs and agents’ commissions. This makes selling after only short periods of ownership undesirable, indicating that those who are choosing to do this are likely to be experiencing financial stress.

During the second half of 2023, thousands of mortgages rolled over from fixed periods of two or three years at interest rates below 2 percent or 3 percent to variable rates of above 5 percent or 6 percent. Some of these sales may reflect the ‘mortgage cliff’ effect of this change. Looking ahead, Ms Owen pointed out that the Reserve Bank of Australia is forecasting unemployment to rise to 4.2% by the end of 2024 and “this will test serviceability, and may lead to an increase in motivated selling for mortgagors with high debt levels and low savings buffers”.

Ms Owen also emphasises that short-term loss-making resales make up only a small portion of the Australian housing market and this was not expected to change. “This is ultimately a small share of mortgagors, so the portion of short–term resales is not expected to grow substantially from where it is now. Ongoing increases in home values nationally should contain the rate of loss-making short–term resales, though capital growth conditions were looking weaker across Sydney and Melbourne to the end of [2023],” she said.

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

The Australian locations where homeowners are selling at a loss

The portion of properties sold at a loss within three years of ownership has almost doubled in one year

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.