In tonight’s show our Property Insider Edwin Almeida and I chuckle at the “innovative” policy for first home buyers being mooted in the USA (no, these do not work: see Australia!), look at price growth in Perth, and a horror story in Logan City, Brisbane, as well as the normal deep dive in the numbers. And at the end a really useful tip, as usual!
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Today’s post is brought to you by Ribbon Property Consultants.
If you are buying your home in Sydney’s contentious market, you do not need to stand alone. This is the time you need to have Edwin from Ribbon Property Consultants standing along side you.
Buying property, is both challenging and adversarial. The vendor has a professional on their side.
Emotions run high – price discovery and price transparency are hard to find – then there is the wasted time and financial investment you make.
Edwin understands your needs. So why not engage a licensed professional to stand alongside you. With RPC you know you have: experience, knowledge, and master negotiators, looking after your best interest.
Shoot Ribbon an email on info@ribbonproperty.com.au & use promo code: DFA-WTW/MARTIN to receive your 10% DISCOUNT OFFER.
On Friday, RBA Governor Michele Bullock and her new look team were questioned by the House Economics Committee in Canberra for most of the morning. And I watched it all, so you don’t have to! There was very little new at one level, because the bank had recently released its statement on monetary policy and rate `decision.
Recall that the Reserve Bank left the key rate at a 12-year high of 4.35% and maintained its hawkish rhetoric. Money markets and economists still reckon the RBA’s next move will be a cut, though they’re split on the timing. Traders are betting December will be the beginning of the easing cycle, while the consensus of economists is it will only start sometime in 2025.
It’s clear from Governor Bullocks opening statement, that Australia’s central bank remains some way off easing monetary policy because inflation is proving persistent and will only return back to the target range late next year. “The board remains vigilant to upside risks to inflation,” Bullock said in her opening statement to a parliamentary panel in Canberra on Friday. “It is premature to be thinking about rate cuts.”
Supporting the RBA’s caution, data this week showed Australia’s labor market continued to add jobs at a solid pace while wage growth remains elevated. See my earlier show “When things don’t add up at the RBA. Separate figures pointed to a small rebound in consumer sentiment and business confidence is holding up.
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
This is an edited version of a live discussion with Leith van Onselen, Chief Economist at Nucleus Wealth and Co-founder of Macrobusiness as we pick apart the latest economic myths across property and the economy.
Original show is here: https://youtube.com/live/bT-hxYrjJ1A
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog
DFA Live Q&A HD Replay: Property Sandcastles And Other Myths: With Leith van Onselen
Demand for a place to live remains very high, driven by population growth from mega-high migration and low but perhaps improving vacancy rates in the rental sector. We know that roughly one third of households own their own property, outright, one third own with a mortgage, and one third rent. Those in the last two categories are expanding, while those who own outright are shrinking as a proportion of the total – though with some state variations.
Over recent decades, the Government has effectively outsourced the provision of rental housing to the private sector, via mum and dad investors, who get considerable tax breaks to hold property for rent, and more recently though the rise of the so-called build to rent sector, which is being held out as a solution to the lack of property for rent.
The critical question is do we want to go further into the mire of neo-liberalism and let big international investors build homes to rent in Australia, with rents that according to Cameron Murray are typically higher than local providers, while offering even more tax breaks, to corporates, or should the Government get back into the home building game, (see my discussion with Elisa Barwick yesterday) through a public bank, and also dial back migration to a sustainable level. Ideology apart the answer seems obvious, and yet… they still want more migrations to pump GDP and more build to rent to meet a housing target which was built in fairy land.
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Today’s post is brought to you by Ribbon Property Consultants.
In today’s deep dive, Elisa Barwick from the Australian Citizens Party shares her research on why housing has become so expensive, and what can be done about it. But this is not the normal discussion of high migration or currently government policy, rather it sheets the cause to a chapter of history dominated by neo-liberalists, austerity and the rise of technocrats who still now dominate our lives.
Another outing with Journalist Tarric Brooker, as we pick over the latest data, with a focus on what is happening in the real economy. We also discuss the real race many are running in terms of no real income growth, and the political and economic implications of this ahead.
You can find Tarric’s charts at https://www.burnouteconomics.com/
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog
Welcome To The Alternative Olympics: With Tarric Brooker
This is an edited version of a live discussion with Dr Cameron Murray, Independent Economist over at Fresh Economic Thinking.
Fresh Economic Thinking is Australia’s newest think-tank, with independent and insightful takes on major economic debates.
Cameron thinks economics could be much better than it is so he often writes very fine technical critiques of economic theory and comments on the nature of the profession. He specialises in property and housing markets, environmental economics, and corruption. I dabble in just about everything: macro, money, institutions, evolutionary economics, and more.
For the past four years, he was a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in the Henry Halloran Trust at The University of Sydney.
Well, last week we got a glimpse of the vulnerability of global IT systems, including payment systems, the latest and perhaps most significant of a chapter of accidents, ranging from banks systems going down, through to disruption from floods and fire, when only physical payments in cash were accepted. US cyber-security firm CrowdStrike said it was responsible for the mayhem, which started on Friday after sending a ‘defective’ update to machines running Microsoft apps. Microsoft has suggested customers try rebooting their computers 15 times to resolve the issue.
The IT outage prompted federal politician Bob Katter to demand cash remains in circulation amid the “danger” of relying on digital technology. “This a wake-up call that the risk associated with a cashless society is too high for us to pay,” Mr Katter said.
According to a recent online survey, titled Cashless Future 2024’ while fewer payments may be made in cash these days, Australians are still expressing serious concerns about heading towards a cashless society. Seven in 10 say they’ve concerned, while two in five Aussies are extremely concerned about notes and coins becoming relics.
Significantly, even people who don’t use cash can be concerned about moving towards a cashless society for reasons including privacy concerns, security risks and dependency on technology. This includes concerns about their transaction data being tracked and analysed by corporations or government agencies, and digital payment systems can sometimes be vulnerable to technology outage, hacking or fraud. A recent report said: “Concerns about technological glitches, network outages, or power failures could lead to worries about being unable to make payments in the absence of cash.”
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog
Cash: Wake Up, Its The Antidote To Digital Dystopia!
Households will see Inflation around for much longer than expected and while the pressure on households continue to build, so does distrust across the economy in Australia, according to data from the IMF and a special Roy Morgan End of Financial Year webinar.
Despite the better-than-expected US inflation figures, the International Monetary Fund in its quarterly update of the World Economic Outlook just warned that momentum on global disinflation had slowed, largely due to ongoing elevated rates of services inflation.
For example, the latest data today for the UK showed that The Consumer Prices Index inflation unexpectedly stays at 2% in June, higher than economists predicted and causing a paring of bets on when the Bank of England will cut rates at its next meeting. The news sent the pound above $1.30 for the first time in a year. Services inflation that has been a special focus of the BOE was also unchanged at 5.7%. Economists had expected the headline rate to drop to 1.9%, while the central bank had forecast services at 5.1% by now. Traders pushed back bets on a rate cut next month, pricing in a roughly 30% chance of a move on Aug. 1, down from almost 50% yesterday.
In Australia, the June quarter consumer price index on July 31 will be decisive in determining whether the Reserve Bank of Australia will be forced to deliver a 14th interest rate rise at its August 6 board meeting. With underlying inflation running about 4 per cent, markets are pricing in a 16 per cent chance the RBA will raise the cash rate to 4.6 per cent, from 4.35 per cent, when it next meets. That said, bets on another rate rise from the RBA eased over the past week as bond markets rallied on the back of an outright decline in the US consumer price index, though I think the read across from the US by the markets is over done.
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Today’s post is brought to you by Ribbon Property Consultants.
Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog
Corporates Gouge, While IMF Warns The Inflation Squeeze Will Be On For Longer Than Expected!
Back in 2021 the Census revealed a shocking “one million homes were unoccupied”.
But now we have a new survey from economic research organisation Prosper Australia, looking at empty homes in Melbourne from 2019 to 2023. The report SPECULATIVE VACANCIES 11 makes the point that while around 30,000 people in Victoria have no home, it is hard to quantify the number of homes that have no people. This they attempt to do.
To access vacancy, Prosper measures vacancy rates across metropolitan Melbourne using data from Melbourne’s three water retailers – Yarra Valley Water, South East Water and Greater Western Water.
They found that of the 1.9 million dwellings with active water connections in the study area, in total 97,861 dwellings sat empty or under-used over the entire year: 5.2% of all dwellings in metropolitan Melbourne, or one in 20 homes. These vacant dwellings represent a huge pool of valuable resources not being used productively. At the average household size they could accommodate over 250,000 people.
If this were replicated across Australia, it could be there are sufficient spare homes to meet current need! This should be a top political issue, but one no-one wants to touch!
http://www.martinnorth.com/
Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/
Today’s post is brought to you by Ribbon Property Consultants.
Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog
The Shame Of Vacant Property In A Time Of Homelessness!
