The news isn’t good for landlords, rent growth rates are grinding to a halt. Picture: Thinkstock

Just as price growth begins to slow, rents are also on a slow down and going backwards in some capital cities.

The latest CoreLogic RP Data rent review revealed capital city rents fell by 0.1 per cent in October, although the picture is slightly rosier on an annual basis with rents up 0.6 per cent.

Rents only rose in Sydney, Hobart and Canberra during October, but those increases were minor, 0.1 per cent, 0.2 per cent and 0.3 per cent respectively.

Darwin had the biggest drop in rents during the month of 1.7 per cent and compared with the same time last year rents were down by 12.7 per cent.

Rents fell in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth also but remained the same in Melbourne.

In the past 12 months the best capital city for rental growth has been Sydney, but that was only an increase of 2.2 per cent, which would equate to $13.20 extra a week on a $600 a week rental.

CoreLogic RP Data senior research analyst Cameron Kusher believed rental growth would continue to slow during the next few months.

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Cameron Kusher of CoreLogic RP Data said rents were most likely to start falling within the next 12 months.Source:Supplied

He said the pace of rental growth was slowing in the three cities which had had the most new housing supply and investor activity in recent years, Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

“It is clear that the increase in investment stock is providing landlords with little scope to lift rental rates while the low mortgage rate environment provides little incentive to push yields higher,’’ he said.

“I think there is probably a decent chance that across the combined capital cities that rents will start falling within the next 12 months.

“There is still a lot of new properties under construction at the moment, particularly units, and units tend to be much more likely to be rented than houses, so that stock still has to come on line and that is going to limit the opportunities for investors to lift rental rates, because those renters are going to have a lot more choice.

Mr Kusher said the figures showed there had been a pretty sharp slowdown in rental growth across most markets.

“It is petty much a record low,’’ he said.