The Quarterly MLC Australian Wealth Behaviour Survey has been released, which reveals that an increasing number of Australians are concerned they will fall well short of being able to fund their retirements, with more households focusing on paying-down debts:
An increasing number of Australians believe they will fall far short of being able to fund their retirements, which may be leading to a greater focus on paying down debt and putting more aside in savings, according to the latest research from MLC.
Between the fourth quarter of 2016 and first of 2017, the MLC Wealth Sentiment Survey Q1 2017 recorded an increase in Australians who think they will have “far from enough” in retirement, up from 24 per cent to 32 per cent of respondents…
The survey also shows Australians are now taking debt and saving more seriously.
Overall, 21 per cent of Australians plan to pay off more debt in the next three months, outweighing those who intend to pay off less debt (13 per cent) than they were previously. Further, 26 per cent intend to save more and 19 per cent save less…
Only three in ten Australians are comfortable borrowing to invest, with a third of these preferring investing in property…
Predictably, most older Australians own their homes (many outright), with the average over-50 Australian household having $731,000 in equity:
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But most are not planning to use their homes to fund their retirements:
Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness.
Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.
