Australian Property

Via LF Economics: Australia has experienced an astounding rise in housing prices over the last two decades which has rendered it one of the world’s most unaffordable.

APRA is out with its quarterly ADI housing exposures and there are some encouraging signs for macrprudential 2.0.

Hello, from the HIA: The HIA New Home Sales report – a monthly survey of the largest volume home builders in the five largest states – show that sales volumes declined by 3.7 per cent in July 2017 compared to the June 2017.

Lot’s of material today from CEDA on the bubble: Historically low interest rates, an unprecedented period of continuous economic growth and strong levels of migration have contributed to ever escalating real housing prices in Australia’s capital cities.

Chanticleer suggests we look to what APRA did to NAB following its forex travails in 2003: APRA conducted a review into that incident and delivered its findings to the NAB board which then released it publicly.

There are two angles on the rapidly falling Chinese housing bid.

Via the AFR: A Melbourne family  is set for a cash bonanza with a 153-hectare farm on the city’s northern fringe tipped to sell to developers for more than $100 million.

Leith will return next week so today we’ll have to rely on CoreLogic charts for house prices and sundry indexes: Last week was down.

Via CoreLogic: Auction activity increased across the combined capital cities this week, with 2,239 homes taken to auction; the largest number of auctions held since the first week of June.

Pretty weird stuff this at the AFR: At least 14 buyers who bought apartments off the plan in a tower in Sydney’s south-west are facing the loss of their investment after the developer defaulted on a loan from a British Virgin Island lender, backed by a Chinese bank.

Ah, Jess Irvine: The team at ABC’s Four Corners assembled a thrilling package about the Australian property boom last Monday.

From S&P: The number of delinquent housing loans underlying Australian prime residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) fell to 1.15% in June from 1.21% in May, according to a recent report by S&P Global Ratings.

When Hong Kong doesn’t want to be Hong Kong.

From the usually smarter Adam Creighton today: Strictly speaking, there’s no housing affordability crisis.

Via Gotti today: Australians who own dwellings and plan to work or live overseas need to think again.

From one very confused immigration booster, Rob Burgess, today: The Coalition has ramped up its ‘socialist’ attack on the opposition, hoping to counter Labor’s ongoing campaign against ‘inequality’.

Cross-posted from Investing in Chinese Stocks.

From the HIA: “The housing sector has already stepped back from its role driving the Australian economy and now is not the time for governments to hit the industry with punitive charges,” warned Tim Reardon, HIA’s Principal Economist.

Oh dear: What is its strategy?

Via SCMP: Cash-rich Chinese firms – the big spenders in the global property market in the past four years – are getting cold feet as Beijing tightens controls on outbound investment.

A slow news day always throws up the loons.

From The Conversation.

Via the AFR: A quarter of Chinese buyers purchase residential property and hold it empty as an investment, a survey by investment bank UBS of mainland Chinese customers shows.