Australian Property

From The Advisor: The Westpac Group has updated its credit policies so borrower expenses will need to be captured at an “itemised and granular level” across 13 different categories and include expenses that will continue after settlement as well as debts with other institutions.

By Leith van Onselen Yesterday afternoon, The ABC reported that the Australian Transactions Reports & Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) will now start policing money laundering via cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin: The new law gives AUSTRAC the powers to police digital currency exchanges (DCEs) trading in a variety of crypto currencies including bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple.

By Leith van Onselen Australian Finance Group (AFG) has released its housing finance data for the March quarter, which registered another quarterly fall in mortgage applications, with annual applications falling as well.

By Leith van Onselen With the release yesterday of Australia’s dwelling commencements and completions data for the December quarter of 2017, it’s an opportunity time to once again examine how Australia’s dwelling supply is tracking against population growth.

By Martin North, cross-posted from the Digital Finance Analytics Blog: In the second part of our series on the anatomy of the property auction results, we dive deeper into the numbers.

By Leith van Onselen The ABS has released dwelling construction data for the December quarter of 2017, which recorded falls in both dwelling commencements and completions.

This is big, via the AFR: Home loan applicants at Westpac will have to reveal spending on everything from pet care to tax and toiletries, under a tough new “responsible lending” regime being introduced from next Tuesday.

By Leith van Onselen The Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI) has released a new report calling for “inclusionary zoning” policies, which force developers to supply housing for lower income earners, to be rolled-out across Australian housing projects in a bid to boost the supply of affordable housing.

Via Capital Economics today: What next for house prices?

By Leith van Onselen CoreLogic has released its Cordell Construction Monthly report, which reveals that the value of apartment applications almost halved in March, although overall construction value of new projects captured over the month was $12.8 billion, up $0.2 billion from February.

Credit Suisse’s Hasan Tevfik has the note: A few more charts: Winners and losers: Hmm, not bad.

By Leith van Onselen AMP Capital’s Shane Oliver has penned a report at Investing.com predicting more downside for Sydney and Melbourne property values, but arguing that a crash is unlikely given such strong immigration-driven population growth: With prices falling in Sydney and Melbourne some see this as the start of a crash.

By Leith van Onselen Executive Director of the NSW Property Council, Jane Fitzgerald, penned a spurious article in The SMH yesterday spruiking government plans to force further development across Sydney’s suburbs [my emphasis]: Sydney is growing just as it has always grown.

CoreLogic released its auction report yesterday, which reported a largely stable preliminary national auction clearance rate – i.e. 65.3% this week compared to 65.5% a fortnight ago (later revised down to 66.0%).

Paul Keating yesterday at the AFR conference: Mr Keating said the banks were facing tighter controls as a result of the Basel rules on capital adequacy, while financial regulators had had a “gutful” of them.

By Leith van Onselen In the week ended 5 April 2018, the CoreLogic 5-city daily dwelling price index, which covers the five major capital city markets, rose by 0.04%: It was the first weekly increase in values for 13 weeks.

Via The Australian: The oversupply of apartments in inner Brisbane may not be resolved until 2021, despite the cancellation or deferral of 52 new projects.