Brisbane is the only capital holding more auctions than a year ago

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Brisbane held 161 auctions in the week ending Sunday 9 August, and it was the only capital city to hold more than it did in the same week a year earlier. That is the finding of the final clearance rate release Cotality published on Thursday 13 August, which put the year-ago figure at 124 auctions and the rise at 29.8 per cent.

The city's final clearance rate for the week was 35.4 per cent, down from 37.5 per cent the week before. Cotality described it as the lowest of any capital with a large enough number of auctions to compare.

More auctions, fewer of them selling

The week-on-week change in Brisbane was also upwards. Cotality counted 161 auctions against 136 in the week ending 2 August, a rise of 18.4 per cent. For the week now under way, the week ending 16 August, the firm has 146 auctions scheduled in Brisbane. That is 9.3 per cent fewer than last week, yet still 7.4 per cent more than the 136 held in the matching week of 2025.

The clearance rate moved the other way. Brisbane's 35.4 per cent was 23.5 percentage points lower than in the same week of 2025, according to Cotality, which implies a rate of 58.9 per cent a year ago. A year ago, then, Brisbane had fewer auctions and more than half of them sold. This August it has more auctions and a little over a third selling.

In homes, the difference is small. A rate of 58.9 per cent on 124 auctions is about 73 sales. A rate of 35.4 per cent on 161 is about 57. Those counts are worked out from Cotality's published rates and totals, so they are approximate to within a home. What has grown is the other column: roughly 104 Brisbane auctions without a sale last week, against about 51 in the same week of 2025.

The two movements are not necessarily in conflict. A seller chooses auction, and sets a date, before the campaign begins. A higher count of auctions therefore shows how many owners chose that route some time earlier. The clearance rate shows what happened when the day arrived.

A pattern, with one exception

The week ending 9 August was not a one-off. Cotality's releases since early July show Brisbane ahead of last year's auction count in most weeks. Its preliminary figures for the week ending 12 July had the city 25.5 per cent up on the year. The 164 auctions of the week ending 19 July compared with 154 a year earlier, and the 136 of the week ending 2 August with 128. In its release of 6 August the firm called Brisbane the only capital with higher volumes on both the weekly and the annual comparison.

The exception was the last week of July, when Cotality's early count put Brisbane's 134 auctions 28.3 per cent under the same week of 2025.

The clearance rate has been steadier than the volume. Brisbane's final figure was 29.5 per cent for the week ending 26 July, then 37.5 per cent, which Cotality described as the city's highest in seven weeks, and now 35.4 per cent. That last figure is the one the city also recorded for the weeks ending 12 July and 19 July. Monday's preliminary reading for last week, published on 10 August, was 38.1 per cent from 126 reported results out of 163 auctions, so the final count trimmed it by 2.7 points.

How the other capitals compare

Nationally the picture ran in the opposite direction on volume. Cotality counted 1,382 auctions across the combined capitals in the week ending 9 August. That was 9.9 per cent more than the 1,257 of the week before, but 12.9 per cent fewer than the 1,587 held in the same week last year.

The weighted average final clearance rate across the capitals was 51.4 per cent, up 2.5 percentage points from 48.9 per cent and the highest final rate in twelve weeks. It remained 17.3 points under the 68.7 per cent recorded a year earlier. Melbourne finalised at 56.8 per cent from 659 auctions and Sydney at 51.5 per cent from 412. Adelaide and Canberra each recorded 46.8 per cent, from 94 and 47 auctions.

Brisbane's annual fall in the clearance rate was not the steepest. Cotality's release puts Melbourne's rate 11.8 points under its level of a year ago and Sydney's 19.0 points under, with Brisbane at 23.5, Adelaide at 23.9 and Canberra at 28.6. Brisbane stands out for the combination: it is the one capital where the count went up while the rate came down by more than 20 points.

The schedule for the week ending 16 August shows where the national shortfall sits.

Melbourne and Sydney between them have 598 fewer auctions booked than they held a year ago. Brisbane and Adelaide have 12 more. Across all the capitals, Cotality lists 1,323 auctions for the week, 31.1 per cent fewer than a year earlier.

Why the southern calendars are thinner

Earlier in the week, in its preliminary release of Monday 10 August, Cotality gave one explanation for the thinner southern calendars. It estimated that auctions made up about 40 per cent of new capital city listings in late March, and about 26 per cent by the first week of August. Sellers are still listing, on that account, and fewer of them are choosing a public auction to do it.

The firm did not publish that share for Brisbane alone, so it cannot be said from these figures whether Brisbane sellers are choosing auction more often than before, or whether more homes are simply coming to market.

The season and the cycle both play a part in Cotality's reading. Its release of 6 August dated the autumn peak to the week ending 29 March, when 3,983 capital city auctions were held, close to three times last week's count. The same release described a decelerating market in which vendors are cautious and listing fewer properties, and noted that the firm's national Home Value Index fell 0.7 per cent in July, the largest monthly decline since December 2022.

Sellers who do go ahead are also following through more often. The 10 August release put withdrawn auctions at 16.2 per cent of those scheduled across the capitals, the lowest share since late April, compared with 23.7 per cent in the week ending 21 June. Cotality attributed the improvement in the national clearance rate to that fall and not to stronger bidding.

Brisbane's auction calendar is fuller than it was last winter. The share of those auctions ending in a sale is what has changed.

The coastal markets in the same week

Cotality's summary of final results by sub-region covers the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast. On the Gold Coast, 48 auctions were held in the week ending 9 August and 15 were recorded as sold, a final clearance rate of 31.3 per cent. On the Sunshine Coast, 20 auctions were held and 5 sold, a rate of 25.0 per cent.

Both counts are small. With 20 auctions, each sale or failed sale moves the Sunshine Coast rate by five points, so a single week says little about direction. The week before, 12 of its 30 auctions sold and the rate was 40.0 per cent. The Gold Coast's 48 auctions is closer to a usable sample, and its rate sat about four points under Brisbane's. It was also the Gold Coast's best final result in five weeks: the same 15 sales a week earlier, from 62 auctions, had given 24.2 per cent.

Unlike the capital, neither coast held more auctions than the week before. The two together went from 92 auctions to 68 while Brisbane went from 136 to 161.

What is scheduled next

After the 1,323 auctions listed for the week ending 16 August, Cotality expects about 1,390 homes to be scheduled across the capitals in each of the following two weeks, around 5 per cent more. The firm read the modest rise as a sign that sellers are bringing more stock to market as spring approaches, while noting that volumes remain below where they stood a year ago. Brisbane accounts for 146 of the 1,323 auctions on this week's list, about one in nine.

Its preliminary results for the week ending 16 August are due on Monday 17 August, and the final figures on Thursday 20 August.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

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