2009.03.19 07:40:34
Home buyers do some serious shopping is the headline in an article I read today.
The article then went on to say The Australian housing finance market is showing little sign of slowing down, according to January 2009 data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Supposedly first home buyers are increasing their share of the market’s value, helping along the figures for owner occupiers, which also show further positive movement.
According to the ABS, figures show that the total value of housing finance commitments increased by 0.7 per cent in January, following an increase of 5.9 per cent in December.
When interviewed managing Director of national broker Mortgage Choice, Paul Lahiff, said that it is pleasing to see housing finance figures tracking well in what is usually a much slower month than most.
He also said “It demonstrates what our loan consultants have been telling us – many home buyers have been doing some serious property shopping regardless of mid-summer festivities”. – I don’t believe this is the case based upon my experiences with both my mortgage broking business and with trying to sell 2 of my investment properties.
The article went on to say that this is the fourth month of positive news about the owner occupier market, with the total value of such loans rising 2.3 per cent and the number of loans rising 3.5 per cent.
“First homebuyers continued their lengthy grand entrance over January 2009, though at a reduced pace than in December 2008, with the number decreasing by 13 per cent to 12,499″, Lahiff commented.
“This slowdown in January, traditionally a much slower month, is understandable.”
We saw some great leaps in numbers from October (9,901) to November (11,775) to December (14,413).
The number of first homebuyers as a percentage of the total value of January’s housing finance commitments was 26.5 per cent, the highest proportion since the series commenced in 1991. This was up from 25.7 per cent in December and 23.6 per cent in November.
Loans for the construction of dwellings (2.5 per cent) and the purchase of established dwellings (3.9 per cent) also continued to show significant improvement, though growth in investment housing-fixed loans (- 3.8 per cent) and in the purchase of new dwellings (- 1.4
per cent) dropped over the month.
“Regarding the drop in value of investment loans, we are hearing that investors are slowly coming back into the market but are hesitant because there is much competition from first homebuyers”, Mr Lahiff said.
“Some say they are waiting for the First Home Owner Boost to finish up.”
So why I ask is it so difficult to sell one of my properties over there? (1 has sold now at a slight discount to its valuation a year ago).
Is this just the media trying to hype things up again and start a new property surge?
Probably.