Auction activity takes a back seat to Grand Finals and long weekend festivities, sending the preliminary combined capitals clearance rate below 50% for the first time since December 2012.
There was a significant drop in auction numbers across the combined capital cities this week, with a total of 889 auctions held.
The lower activity is the result of a number of states being host to a long weekend as well as both the AFL and NRL grand finals taking place. 
Preliminary results show a clearance rate of just 49.1 per cent, down from 52.4 per cent last week when final results saw volumes reach their highest level since the last week of April (2,404).
Given such a low preliminary clearance rate, it will be interesting to see if we have any uplift over the next few days as final results are collected.
Over the same week last year, 969 homes were taken to auction returning a clearance rate of 66.3 per cent.
Melbourne saw the most significant drop in volumes this week with only 69 homes taken to auction returning a preliminary auction clearance rate of 55.6 per cent, while last week there were 1,161 auctions held and the final clearance rate came in at 53.8 per cent.
This time last year, 122 auctions were held across the city, returning a clearance rate of 87.0 per cent.
There were 601 auctions held in Sydney this week, down from 851 over the previous week.
The preliminary clearance rate of 49.2 per cent is down from 51.1 per cent last week.
One year ago, 607 auctions were held and the clearance rate came in at 64.9 per cent.
