The latest data from the ABS on home lending for April 2016 indicates that overall lending flow fell in trend terms by 0.3%. But within that, owner occupied lending fell 0.5% while investment housing commitments rose 0.2%. In other words, we are seeing a rotation back towards the investment sector. Since then, several banks have relaxed their investment lending underwriting criteria, and have started to offer bigger discounts. The picture is quite complex.
In seasonally adjusted terms, the total value of dwelling finance commitments excluding alterations and additions fell 1.8%. But we will stick to the trend data, which irons out some of the bumps.
Looking at the overall stock of loans, it rose again to $1.49 trillion, we see that investment loans comprise 35.6% of all loans, still high
Looking at the monthly flows, we see a fall in owner occupied new loans by value, and a small rise in investment loans. The momentum in the refinance sector has slowed a little, but rose as a proportion of all loans.
Turning to first time buyers, we a rise in the number of new owner occupied and investor loans, together the show around 10,000 new first time buyers entering the market. This is an original, not trend data set.
The largest volume of owner occupied loans was for the purchase of established dwellings, and to total value fell. The proportion of loans refinance rose again, to nearly 35% of all loan values.
Looking at owner occupied loans, the purchase of new dwellings has risen a bit, but is still 4% lower whilst other types of borrowing are relatively static.
By state owner occupied loans grew the strongest in ACT and VIC, whilst TAS showed the largest fall.
Finally, looking at lender type, we see that the non-banks grew the strongest (up 0.8%), building societies lost momentum (down 7%), and banks lent slightly less thin month (down 0.7%).
