Cases decline
Mixed news for Melbourne - the economy remains in lockdown, and, while other cities and states are seeing JobSeeker numbers declining, Victoria saw its numbers leap by 4 per cent in a month to 413,000.
On the positive side of the ledger, new COVID-19 cases in Victoria now appear to be in a beautiful freefall, with only 14 newly confirmed cases on Sunday, and the first murmurings about restrictions being eased sometime.
Although that said, Andrews - who appears increasingly keen to be extend the state's powers to extreme levels - stated that nothing is up for debate, which suggests that Step 4 won't even be contemplated until November 23.
There are now only 8 cases remaining in Victoria's ICUs.
The target for Victoria of 'zero cases for 14 days' must still feel like light years away to locked up residents, with 791 active cases remaining across the state.
Auctions pick up
While Melbourne's residents have been shut indoors for weeks on end, the rest of the country has been enjoying the prospect of much cheaper mortgage rates.
The preliminary auction results this week continued their uptrend of recent weeks and were seen to be the strongest since March, according to CoreLogic, with clearance rates back at the levels we were seeing before the virus became a critical issue.
Source: CoreLogic
In particular, strong results for clearance rates were recorded for Canberra and Sydney, while Domain reported a median sales price for Brisbane in excess of $1 million for the weekend's smattering of auction sales.
