Housing bust smashes household wealth

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The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released its Finance & Wealth data for the March quarter, which reported further falls in household wealth:

Chief Economist for the ABS, Bruce Hockman, said: “Residential real estate experienced its fifth consecutive quarter of real holding losses. However, household wealth per person fell by only $1,500 to $404,566 per person in the March quarter reflecting the impact of the rebound in the share market coming mainly through household superannuation reserves.”

The ratio of mortgage debt to residential real estate assets was 29.0, up from 28.1 in the previous quarter, indicating that mortgage debt grew faster than the value of residential real estate owned by households. The rise reflects falling residential property prices rather than strong growth in mortgage debt. This was the strongest quarterly increase in the ratio since the September quarter 2011 and the ratio is now at its highest level since the June quarter 2013…

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About the author
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.