When Is The Rental Market Most Active and Most Quiet?

We are commonly asked by landlords "How long will it take to rent my property?", and there are of course many factors which influence the answer! One of the less obvious factors can even be the time of year you list your property for rent. 

A recent article from realestate.com.au provides some insight into which months of the year typically see most rental listings and the highest number of rental searches. We summarise the results below, also adding in findings from our own data from Newcastle and Lake Macquarie based on our listings in 2021. 

​Which month has the most new rental listings?

​According to the realestate.com.au research, January is typically the busiest month on the rental market, with 16% more new rental listing added in January than the average across all months. 

​Which month has the least new rental listings?

​In contrast, December has been shown to have the least new rental listings come to market. In December, there are 17.5% less new rental listings than the average. 

​These results are not surprising, as the early part of December sees much activity but this quickly wanes in the leadup to the Christmas and new year slow-down as people take holidays and focus less on house hunting. 

January is always notably stronger, particular as listings and interest at this time of year are lifted with seasonal work relocations, new school year commencements, etc. 

When are people most likely to be searching for a rental property?

The number of listing co-incides with the number of people searching for rentals at these times of year as well, as shown in the following graphs which show that January sees 17.8% more rental searches than average, and December 16.4% less rental searches than average. ​

​What About Rental Activity In Newcastle and Lake Macquarie?

​While the realestate.com.au data is valuable, it does provide insights from a national perspective and is therefore heavily influenced by capital city markets. 

Taking a look at our own agency's rental data for 2021, which is based only on Newcastle and Lake Macquarie rental property data, the notable findings were:

• May and July 2021 offered the highest number of new listings. The significant skew up in January and down in December, as displayed in the realestate.com.au data, was simply not the case locally as experienced by our agency in 2021
• September and October 2021 offered the fewest new listings to the rental market. The September result is somewhat reflected in the 4.9% below average monthly result shown in the realestate.com.au data, but the result we saw for October is not mirrored in their national data
• One clear point of consistency is that, as in the realestate.com.au data, for our agency December 2021 was a significantly quieter than average month in terms of number of enquiries received. We saw a 52% lower-than-average number of enquiries per listing in December, indicating the slow-down experienced at this time of the year was significantly stronger in our local market than presented in the overall realestate.com.au findings
• We found that the highest number of enquiries per listing in 2021 was experienced in October, with 107% (more than double) the average number of enquiries per listing in that month. Not coincidentally, this month also had a 51% lower-than-average number of new listings, indicating that supply was especially tight in October (naturally increasing the number of enquiries on available stock to a significant degree)