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Rather than shut down the market, the coronavirus crisis has sparked a rush in some parts of Melbourne. Mr Cable said some were looking for one or two-bed apartments to use as office space away from their families. Others wanted to move out of shared houses to be more isolated. Others were ending a lease and hoping to lock down somewhere else to live before being locked down themselves.

That rush could soon turn into a trickle – or at least a dramatically different way for the real estate industry to do business – after Prime Minister Scott Morrison, on Tuesday, in a desperate bid to stop coronavirus’ spread, banned auctions and limited house inspections to appointment-only affairs.

Nelson Alexander director Arch Staver said word of the bans had prompted his firm to bring forward several auctions to Monday and Tuesday this week before restrictions came into force. Those that couldn’t be expedited would be sold privately or via expression of interest campaigns.

Mr Staver said he’d been pleasantly surprised to see landlords in some cases offering rent relief to tenants even before it was being asked for. “The fact is that all of us are in this together.”

Clare, who asked that her surname not be used, began looking for a place in Melbourne a month ago. As the coronavirus panic increased, so did competition. “One of the first open [houses] we went to there was one other person,” she said. “Then after that, it was 30 to 40 people per open.”

Clare was organising to stay “with friends or my aunty” when she received the good news from Mr Cable. “It was just relief.”

Deb Carr, a renter in Avondale Heights, has been less fortunate. Last Wednesday – two days after Premier Daniel Andrews called a State of Emergency – she received an eviction notice. Previously, the landlord had dropped the rent to entice her to stay. Now, she has 60 days to get out. Worse, she says, was her agent asking: “Can you get out earlier?”