Aussie mortgage growth smashes records

By Leith van Onselen

Opponents of the view that Australian housing is a bubble often argue that mortgage growth is subdued relative to past experience, hence it is not indicative of bubble-like conditions:

I have never given this argument much regard because the reason why mortgage credit growth is “low” is not because Australians are not taking-out mortgages en masse, but because the debt base has grown to extraordinary levels (see next chart), which represents the denominator in the credit growth formula.