Australian Property

By Leith van Onselen The deflation of Sydney’s housing market ceased this week, with Sydney values rebounding by 0.04% in the week ended 24 May, according to CoreLogic: Sydney home values have now declined by a cumulative 4.6% over the past 37-weeks, with values also down 4.5% over the past 42 weeks.

Via S&P: Australian home loan arrears rose in March. The Standard & Poor’s Performance Index (SPIN) for Australian prime mortgages increased to 1.18% in March from 1.16% in February, according to a recent report by S&P Global Ratings.

Via StuffNZ: In an ideal world, the CEO of Westpac New Zealand would like to see house price growth remain on hold for the next few decades.

By Leith van Onselen Flinders University has released research claiming that planning rules banning the construction of multi-unit flats has contributed to Adelaide’s lack of affordable housing.

Nobody knows what LMI is: Mortgage Choice and CoreData’s new Evolving Great Australian Dream 2018 whitepaper found 42.1% of respondents said they were not sure what LMI was, yet a third (32%) said they would need to pay it in order to get into the property market.

Via the AFR today: Mortgage revaluations of second-hand homes in inner Brisbane are 20 to 30 per cent below their exchanged prices as oversupply fears continue to hit the Queensland capital city, private property lender Development Finance Partners (DFP) say.

By Gareth Aird, senior economist at CBA: Key Points: Australian residential property prices have fallen over the past six months.

By Leith van Onselen The Property Council of Australia (PCA) has released a report claiming that Australia’s large cities are suffering from “governance fragmentation”.

More record lows for the handsome McGrathmageddon today: Now down 85% from the float. No news to drive it so perhaps it’s just the building Sydney and Melbourne property busts. Only one analyst covers it, at Bell (and probably not voluntarily given they underwrote the float), so consensus earnings are a bit biased!

Via CoreLogic comes the leading mortgage index: The last four years have seen big Autumn bounces in borrowing.

By Leith van Onselen ‘Highrise’ Harry Triguboff’s mouthpiece, Robert Gottliebsen, has penned another dire warning of a possible apartment bust: The inner-city apartment property crunch is now starting to really bite.

Call pest control, Melbournians: Melbourne’s mayor-elect Sally Capp is the first woman to take the top job in almost three decades.

CoreLogic released its auction report yesterday, which reported a further fall in the preliminary national auction clearance rate to 60.3% from 61.0% last weekend (later revised down to 58.2%).

Excellent stuff from Damien Boey at Credit Suisse: RBA officials are too optimistic about consumption RBA Deputy Governor Debelle said recently that he could see house prices falling, but consumption growth holding up, despite housing market weakness.

From Chris Joye today: One of the most enduring legacies left by the royal commission will be more conservative and risk-averse banks. This process was already underway after the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) embraced the 2014 financial system inquiry recommendation that the banks deleverage.

By Leith van Onselen The deflation of Sydney’s housing market rolls on, with values falling another 0.10% in the week ended 17 May, according to CoreLogic: Sydney home values have now declined by a cumulative 4.7% over the past 36-weeks, with values also down 4.6% over the past 41 weeks.