> Are Sydney and/or Auckland emptying out? Sydney and Auckland aren't, but Melbourne (in the State of Victoria) is, which endured highly restrictive lock downs for 7-9 months.

From friends and family there, it sounds like apartments in the Melbourne CBD (aka. Downtown / City Centre) are effectively ghost towns, with tenants leaving the city, while still paying rent, and rated rental prices dropping by 25%. The general sentiment seems to be that no-one is interested in being forced into close proximity in home & work situations like you'd find on public transport and apartment blocks. So free standing houses, townhouses with separate entrances are at a massive premium.

From friends and family in New Zealand, it's hard to tell, because the already over-priced and rising market is reaching utterly insane levels, potentially (disclaimer: anecdotal based speculation here) driven by New Zealanders returning home from overseas from countries that are now seen as unsafe.

[0] https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/economy/price-indexes-and-... - Graph: "Residential property prices, quarterly percentage change, September quarter 2020"