National dwelling values nudged 0.1 per cent lower in April, the seventh consecutive month-on-month fall since values started retreating in October of last year, according to the CoreLogic April home value index results out today. 

Similar to previous months, declines were concentrated mostly in the largest capital cities, while the property values of regional dwellings increased by 0.4 per cent. 

The value of dwellings in the major cities recorded a decrease of 0.3 per cent over the month, driven mostly by larger falls of -0.4 per cent in both Sydney and Melbourne, while Brisbane recorded a decline of -0.1 per cent. 

These falls were offset by flat conditions in Perth and subtle rises in Adelaide, Darwin and Canberra. Hobart remained the only capital city to record an increase in dwelling values. 

The data shows that regional areas are now outpacing the capital cities, while unit values outperform house values, according to CoreLogic head of research, Tim Lawless. 

"Despite the surge in unit construction over recent years, the past twelve months has seen unit values continue to trend higher, up 1.9 per cent, compared with a 1 per cent fall in house prices," he said.

Meanwhile, more affordable housing stock has been resilient to value falls. Across the most expensive quarter of the market, house values have increased at nearly twice the pace of the most affordable quarter of the past five years. As conditions have begun to slow down, the most affordable end of the housing market is where property values have remained largely resilient to falls. 

Despite annual capital city gains slowing across Melbourne by 3.7 per cent, many of the city's sub-regions still make the top 10 for growth in dwelling values. 

CoreLogic data shows the weakest performing sub-regions are heavily located around Sydney, with eight of the 10 weakest performing capital city sub-regions in Australia located across Sydney.

After recording a softer performance over the last 13 years, regional markets are now outperforming the capital cities, a trend that has been emerging since September last year.

Lawless told WILLIAMS MEDIA this is mostly attributable to stronger conditions across the larger regional centres that are located within close proximity to major capital cities, as well as improving conditions across the lifestyle markets.

"The latest trends are virtually the complete opposite of what we may have been used to over the last five years or so. We're seeing that regional areas are now outperforming the major capital cities and apartment values are outperforming house values. The most expensive properties are showing much weaker conditions now than more affordable properties," he said. 

Weekly rental rates are also on the rise across the nation at 2 per cent, keeping pace with the same rate of growth as the previous year, but slower than just seven months ago when it recorded a recent high of 2.9 per cent. 

Lawless said that "slower rental growth, particularly in Sydney, is most likely a factor of higher levels of investment which has supported a rise in rental stock combined with a surge in first home buyers which has detracted from rental demand.” 

See also:

Perth market experiencing significant uptick: REIWA

Parts of Sydney record low clearance rates while Melbourne market remains strong: CoreLogic

Melbourne's highest growth suburbs for real estate prices revealed