Marvellous Melbourne’s Astounding property boom and bust

Great Crises of Capitalism includes a chapter on the great Melbourne property boom of the 1880s and the depression of the 1890s.
Melbourne, indeed Australia, has been experiencing a long boom and there are great similarities to the boom that began with the gold rush in 1851.
Henry’s blog today draws some parallels. Clearly the property boom is regenerating, almost it seems from the week in which the RBA let it be known that interest rates would be on hold for some time.
‘Melbourne home owners have enjoyed a boom in price growth over the past 18 months, with the Australian Property Monitors median house price rising by 33 per cent between March 2009 and December 2010.’
At the end of this chapter is a speculation about the likely future of Melbourne property prices.