Home Prices – Page 11 – Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog

Sydney property prices rose in June quarter 2016 after six months of falls, according to figures released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

Prices for established houses in Sydney rose 3.2 per cent and attached dwellings rose 2.0 per cent.

Residential property prices fell in Perth and Darwin, while prices rose in all other capital cities.

Melbourne recorded the strongest through the year growth of 8.2 per cent, followed by Canberra at 6.0 per cent.

Established house prices for the eight capital cities rose 2.3 per cent and attached dwellings rose 1.4 per cent in the June quarter 2016.

The total value of Australia’s 9.7 million residential dwellings increased $138.3 billion to $6.0 trillion. The mean price of dwellings in Australia is now $623,000.

The IMF Quarterly Update includes an update of the Global House Price Index. In Australia, the aggregate house price index has been rising in a strong but volatile pattern for the past twenty-five years, and has enjoyed a particularly strong burst of growth since 2013. However, house prices in Perth—surrounded by major mining and petroleum industries and known for providing services to these industries—are declining.

After sixteen quarters of inching upwards, the global house price index shows a small downtick. But it is too soon to tell if this is a reversal in trend.

Over the past year, many more countries have registered house price increases than declines. Australia is the eighth highest (well behind New Zealand!)

Credit growth has also remained strong in many countries, though the overall correlation with house price growth at present is modest. Australia is twelfth, behind USA and Norway.

Among OECD countries, house prices have grown faster than incomes ( Australia ninth highest) and rents since 2010 in about half the countries (Australia twelfth highest).