Australian Property

By Leith van Onselen The Property lobby has united in demanding the new Morrison Government introduce a dedicated Minister for Housing.

From SQM Research’s weekly newsletter: As a reminder, our forecast for 2019 was as follows: So far the market this year has fallen by another 3.8%.

Via the excellent George Theranou at UBS: With actual mortgage rates of ~4% + the new 2.5% buffer, the assessed borrowing rate is likely fall to ~6.5%, below the ~7¼% floor, ‘notionally’ increasing borrowing capacity by ~8%.

Via Cameron Kusher: APRA looks to loosen lending limits – CoreLogic research analyst Cameron Kusher: Earlier today, the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) issued a letter to all authorised deposit-taking institutions (ADI) regarding consultation on revisions to prudential practice guide APG 223 residential mortgage lending.

Fresh from Deep T, MB’s big time banking insider: You have no idea of the smugness of the whole mortgage industry.

By Leith van Onselen Labor had planned to ban trailing commissions for mortgage brokers from 1 July 2020, so its defeat at the federal election has been welcomed by the mortgage broking sector.

And that’s how it long it took for our corrupt system to turn itself around: The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has begun consulting on possible revisions to its guidance on the serviceability assessments that authorised deposit-taking institutions (ADIs) perform on residential mortgage loan applications.

Via the UBS property bears: Election result materially reduces downside risk for UBS view on housing The main implication of the election is the absence of expected Labor changes, especially to negative gearing, capital gains tax & franking; rather than the Coalition’s mostly ‘status quo’.

With negative gearing reform dead, imminent interest rate cuts, first home buyer subsidies, and likely macro-prudential easing, we expected the Australian housing market to bottom in the second half.

So says everybody!

CoreLogic has released its preliminary auction report, which reported another soft auction clearance rate on very weak election-effected volumes.

Macquarie has dug into the bank’s negative equity reporting and found, guess what, chaos: ANZ’s negative equity data was the highest of the big four at 5 per cent, or 4.25 per cent when offset accounts are factored in.

Via Danielle Wood, Program Director, Budget Policy and Institutional Reform, Grattan Institute at The Conversation: The lowest blow of this election campaign may have come from a firm of real estate agents that abused its position of trust to scare renters about Labor’s proposed negative gearing changes.

Via Domain: Thousands of robocalls by Yellow Brick Road founder Mark Bouris urging voters to reject Labor at Saturday’s election have fallen foul of election laws amid accusations he told “lies” about Bill Shorten’s negative gearing proposals.

Great stuff.