Housing finance declines

The Australian residential property market may be hot right now but the mortgage market is not. Lenders wrote 50,287 loans for owner-occupiers in February, a decline of 1.8 per cent (in seasonally adjusted terms) from the previous month and a continuation of a declining trend that has been evident since July last year. This time last year, lenders were writing 64,000 loans a month for owner-occupiers.

According to the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics housing finance data, released yesterday, the value of home loans for owner occupiers has fallen from more than $17 billion a month in the middle of last month to a little over $14 billion in February.

First home buyers continue to drop out of the market. Loans to first home buyers made up only 18.1 per cent of total dwellings financed in February, down from 20.5 per cent in January and a peak of 28 per cent in April last year.

The group that appeared to be emerging as the driver of the market - investors - also ran out of steam in February. The value of investment housing finance commitments (in seasonally adjusted terms) fell 1.1 per cent in February.