Why Open Homes Alone Are Costing You The House You Actually Want

You walk out of a Saturday inspection, forty minutes in, twenty other people breathing down your neck, and you can’t remember whether the second bedroom had a window. Sound familiar?

That’s the moment most buyers make a decision they later regret. Either they push through on a hunch and find the problems after they move in, or they pull back, wait for the “next one”, and watch the market move without them.

Jason Pellegrino, President of Domain, sat down with Mark Bouris on Property Insights and made a point worth sitting with. The gap between finding a property, knowing a property, and feeling a property is where most buyers get stuck. And that gap is starting to close in a way that changes how you should approach your next purchase.

Key points

• Domain has been acquired by Costar, a US-based real estate data business with 40 years of history and 1,600 researchers globally.
• From 1 July, Domain is rolling out free professional photography, drone shots and 3D Matterport tours across roughly 145,000 listings a year in Australia.
• Pellegrino’s updated forecast has Sydney and Melbourne dwelling values falling in the mid-to-high single digits over the next 12 to 18 months.
• For the first time in about five years, Domain is forecasting units to outperform houses over the next 18 months.
• Confidence, not the rate itself, is what’s pausing buyers right now.

What’s actually changing in the way you search

Domain’s heritage is residential listings. Costar’s heritage is commercial data, the sort of platform Pellegrino compares to Bloomberg for property. The merger brings that depth of data across to Australia and, more importantly for you as a buyer, it changes what a listing page can actually do.

From 1 July, Domain is offering free professional photography, drone shots and 3D imaging on around 145,000 listings a year through its premium agent packages. The technology behind it is called Matterport, which produces a full walk-through of the property you can explore from home, with millimetre-accurate measurements.

In Pellegrino’s words:

“It’s not enough to find the property or know the property, you have to feel the property.” Jason Pellegrino, President, Domain

That’s the shift. The listing is no longer a brochure. It’s becoming a way to spend real time in the property before you ever step through the door.

Why This Matters for the decision you’re making

Think about how a typical purchase plays out. You scroll listings, you shortlist a few, you rush through an open home, you make an offer or bid at auction, and then you find out what you missed once the keys are in your hand.

Better imagery doesn’t remove the need for an inspection. Open homes are still where you feel the street, the light, the noise. But three practical things change when a property has a proper 3D tour attached:

1. You can measure before you offer. Will your existing furniture fit? Is the second bedroom actually a bedroom or a study with ambition? You can check without a tape measure and a second inspection.
2. You can bring other people in. Your partner who’s interstate, your parents, a builder mate, a mortgage broker looking at the layout for a future renovation. All of them can walk through it with you.
3. You can look at properties in other cities properly. If you’re a Sydney buyer considering an investment in Brisbane or Perth, the cost of getting on a plane for a maybe used to sink deals. Now it doesn’t have to.

We’re seeing more borrowers ask about interstate investment purchases, and this is exactly the sort of change that makes those conversations more practical.

The forecast borrowers need to hear. Domain is releasing an updated property price forecast that, according to Pellegrino, is the first to incorporate both the recent budget changes and the recent moves in interest rates. Two things stood out.

Sydney and Melbourne are past the peak. Domain’s forecast has been upgraded from low single-digit falls to mid-to-high single-digit falls over the next 12 to 18 months, in the range of four to seven per cent at a city level. Individual suburbs will move differently, some more, some less.

Units are set to outperform houses. Pellegrino says it’s the first time in about five years Domain has made that call. The driver is affordability. Investors and owner-occupiers are more price-conscious, and units are where the value sits.

The other capital cities are still growing but the pace has slowed, and Domain expects them to move toward decline over the next 12 to 18 months as the cycle catches up.

None of this is a Yellow Brick Road prediction. It’s Domain’s view, released alongside their research. But it lines up with what other data providers have been saying, and it’s worth weighing when you plan your next move.

Confidence is doing more than the cash rate is

Here’s the line from the conversation that’s easy to miss but genuinely useful.

“Transactions are actually more driven by people’s confidence about the future trajectory… if I’m not confident about what the next six months is going to hold, what do I do? I pause, and I wait.”

Jason Pellegrino, President, Domain

Pellegrino’s point is that buyers don’t freeze because rates are high. They freeze because they can’t see where rates are going next. The 2022 rate rise cycle is the example. Once the direction settled, transactions started again, just at reset budgets. Three-bedroom hunters became two-bedroom hunters, and the market moved on.

That’s a useful frame if you’ve been sitting on your hands. The question isn’t “what will rates do?” It’s “what can I afford at today’s rates, and does that get me into the right property for the next ten years?”

Because the other number in Pellegrino’s conversation is the one that gets skipped over. The cost of transacting a property has risen at four and a half times the rate of property prices, driven largely by stamp duty. The average Australian now moves once every ten years, not because life events have changed but because the cost of moving has.

If you’re going to buy, buy for the long hold. Trying to time the exact bottom is a losing game, and the transaction cost punishes anyone who plans to flip.

What this means for your next step

If you’re a first home buyer, the softer Sydney and Melbourne forecast and the unit outperformance call are worth reading carefully. There may be more room to negotiate than there was six months ago, and units in good locations may give you a way in that houses won’t.

If you’re an investor, the picture is different city by city. Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth are still growing but slowing. Sydney and Melbourne are in decline. And the change to negative gearing settings mentioned in the conversation shifts the maths on any strategy built primarily around tax.

If you’re refinancing or thinking about it, this is the time to know what your borrowing capacity actually looks like in the current market, not the market from twelve months ago. Rate moves, budget changes and lender appetite have all shifted.

The Property Insights episode with Jason Pellegrino is worth watching in full at yhomeloans.com.au/property-insights. You can also run the numbers on repayments and borrowing power on the YBR calculators at ybr.com.au/calculators/.

This is usually the point where a quick conversation with a local YBR broker can stop a small decision becoming an expensive one. Whether you’re weighing up a purchase, thinking about refinancing, or just trying to work out what a shifting forecast means for your plans, a broker in your area will look at your specific numbers and give you a straight answer.

Find your local broker at ybr.com.au.

The information in this article is general in nature and does not take into account your personal objectives, financial situation or needs. You should consider whether it is appropriate for you before acting on it. All forecasts and market data cited are the views of the named source, not Yellow Brick Road.