With just 260 Sydney homes auctioned last weekend, sales volume is down 30% on the same time last year. Activity is slighter and listings have slowed across Sydney as vendors survey the potential ‘seller’s market’.

Yet some parts of the Sydney property market are bucking the trend. BresicWhitney saw 103 sales in September, setting a new record for the group.

Our properties are also selling faster. Days-on-market figures are down across the group with listings via our Glebe office now selling 25% sooner – in around 26 days (down from 34 days in August). Our Hunters Hill office’s larger homes sell in around 32 days and Balmain in 23 days. Around Darlinghurst, listings average just 22 days on market, down from 27 in August.

Bucking these trends makes sense when you examine the dynamics of how today’s Sydneysiders buy and sell property. Let’s take a look.

Assisting buyers year-round

More than 4700 people came through BresicWhitney open homes in September, up 1570 on the previous month. We work personally with these buyers, many of which have previously missed out on properties. They’re now educated about price, barriers-of-entry, and they know how to act in this market.

With stronger days-on-market data intrinsically linked to better buyer-connection, our offices communicate with each other to support these active buyers. The scale of this collaboration was key in reducing the time it took to sell a home across the network.

Transcending the ‘franchise’ model

This collaborative approach (perhaps the opposite of a franchise) encourages agents from different areas to support each other matching people with property. Where outdated models lack interactivity that assists today’s buyers and sellers, coordination between multiple offices is a proficiency.

Those 103 September sales stimulated collective conversations with around 10,000 people within one common network. In the digital arena, more than 800 active new buyers joined our off-market platform, with 15% of sales happening without ever hitting the wider market.

An ecosystem built on Sydney patterns

The search patterns of modern Sydney buyers see them shift between desirable regions of similar traits. BresicWhitney’s strategic office locations respond to this behaviour, covering East and Inner West, established city-fringe peninsulas, and North Shore regions.

We identify and encourage buyer-crossover between properties in these areas. Another collaboration that is tangible for both buyers and sellers, it adds consistency for people testing and researching different regions.

To be continued

In 2016’s volatile property market, these new approaches explain BresicWhitney’s record month. As they evolve alongside the movements of modern inner-Sydney inhabitants, they’re becoming the catalyst for an effective result, and a new way of navigating the property market.