CoreLogic’s Cameron Kusher has penned an interesting report comparing the ABS’s property price data for the June quarter to CoreLogic’s hedonic daily index, both of which are pointing to a slowing housing market, particularly in Sydney:
Over the June 2017 quarter, the ABS Index shows combined capital city dwelling prices increased by 1.9% while the CoreLogic Home Value Index showed an increase of a lower 1.6%. As the above graph shows, the results of both indices are closely aligned. The CoreLogic data is already available to August and shows a further cooling in the rate of growth over the three months. Given this we can expect the trend towards slower growth to hold over the September 2017 quarter. In fact, the daily movements in the CoreLogic series is suggesting Sydney values trended slightly lower over the first 20 days of September.
On an annual change basis both indices also indicate a slowing of the rate of growth. Over the 12 months to June 2017, the ABS reports combined capital city dwelling prices rose by 10.2% while CoreLogic data shows capital city dwelling values increasing by 11.1%. Over the 12 months to August 2017, CoreLogic data shows that dwelling value growth has slowed to 9.7% and it is expected that the ABS data once available will also show a similar slowing.
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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.
