Housing News Digest
Housing News Digest
The Tenants' Union Housing News Digest compiles our pick of items from all the latest tenancy and housing media, sent once per week, on Thursdays.
Below is the Digest archive from November 2020 onwards. From time to time you will find additional items in the archive that did not make it into the weekly Digest email. Earlier archives are here, where you can also find additional digests by other organisations.
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Archive
Potential home-buyers warned fixed interest rates to rise as Reserve Bank winds back stimulus
Elizabeth REdman Domain (No paywall)Potential home-buyers are being warned that mortgage rates could get more expensive quickly, even if the Reserve Bank leaves official interest rates on hold for some time.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/potential-home-buyers-warned-fixe…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.‘Likely to lose momentum’: Australia’s dwelling values continue to grow, though the pace is slowing
Melissa Heagney Domain (No paywall)Australia’s booming property market continued to rise in October but the rate of growth has slowed dramatically since the start of the year, as a lack of affordability, less government stimulus and more listings hit the market, new figures show.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/australias-dwelling-values-contin…
# Australia, Housing affordability, Housing market.Signs of housing price boom flagging
Colin Brinsden The New Daily (No paywall)Australia’s house price boom is showing signs of flagging after spiking more than 20 per cent in the past year. The CoreLogic home value index rose 1.49 per cent in October, having steadily lost momentum since hitting a monthly growth peak of 2.8 per cent in March.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/property/2021/11/01/signs-hou…
# Australia, Housing market.Property double whammy makes saving for a home even harder
Matthew Elmas The New Daily (No paywall)Buying a home just became that much harder after banks adopted tough new lending requirements on Monday. The stricter rules, which will require banks to ensure borrowers can service their loans if rates were to rise by 3 percentage points (up from 2.5 points), are expected to cut the average buyer’s borrowing capacity by about 5 per cent.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/property/2021/11/01/property-…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.First-home buyers: Why are first-home purchases at a decade high when it’s so hard to buy a home?
Elizabeth Redman Domain (No paywall)Hopeful first-home buyers face an uncertain outlook only months after reaching their highest levels in a decade, and experts warn many will struggle to achieve home ownership. There were more first-home buyers in January than at any time since the global financial crisis, official figures show, and despite a drop since then, this group is still buying in its highest numbers since 2009. At first glance it seems a paradox when property prices have soared to new records this year, making it harder to get into the market ...
https://www.domain.com.au/news/first-home-buyers-why-are-first-h…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.Interstate buyers help fuel the Gold Coast’s biggest property boom in years: Domain House Price Report
Sarah Webb Domain (No paywall)Sydney and Melbourne buyers with deep pockets have fuelled the Gold Coast’s biggest property boom in years with house prices in coveted coastal coves surging by $1300 a day, according to the latest Domain House Price Report.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/gold-coast-house-prices-1099486/?…
# Australia, Housing market, Landlords and agents.Ingenia Communities’ largest-ever project in NSW to start by April next year as Winarch Capital’s $235M plan mainly approved
(No paywall)Land lease operator Ingenia Communities can start work on its 25ha portion in the southern end of the former Morisset Golf Club after Lake Macquarie Council approved five of six planning applications for a $235 million project including a water park, hotel, tourist park, hotel, cafes and Ingenia’s over-55’s lifestyle residential village on the site. (The Weekly Source)
https://www.theweeklysource.com.au/ingenia-communities-largest-e…
# NSW, Land lease communities, Older people.Challenging the notion of housing reform as “political suicide”: household financial stress analysis of Australian political constituencies
Bill Randolph and William Thackway The Fifth Estate (No paywall)In Australia, where more than 60 per cent of voters own their own home, the notion of housing reform policies that may negatively impact housing prices is widely viewed as “political suicide”. The term has been used to describe moves to reinstate both inheritance taxes (largely relating to property inheritance) and attempts to abolish negative gearing. ... While financial stress among renters and mortgagors was significant prior to the onset of COVID-19, the pandemic has only served to underline the existential threat they pose to Australia’s housing market. ... But the extent of household financial stress among both home buyers and renters – many of whom are the Boomers’ children who aspire to buy but see the prospect receding by the day – related to ever escalating housing costs, may prompt a greater degree of voter support for systematic policy reform. The question is, have we reached the tipping point, and if not now, when?
https://thefifthestate.com.au/energy-lead/local-government-energ…
# Must read Australia, Rent, Federal Government, Home ownership, Housing affordability.