Table of contents
What they’re not telling you about First Home Buyers - featured image
By
A A A

What they’re not telling you about First Home Buyers

Lots of absolute toss is written about the first home buyer in Australia.

And the commentary varies in the extreme – from how active they are; to how lazy they seem and that they want everything on a silver platter. economy-property-market-grow-wealth-house-dream-first-home

And now the Federal government has unveiled their scheme to help up to 10,000 first home buyers on low and middle incomes enter the market each year from January 2020.

Hmmm.

I reckon the following 2 charts and table sum up the real state of play when it comes to buying your first home down under.

 

Top 5 reasons why early adults move back home

 

Reason Percentage
1. Trying to save money 50%
2. Convenient to my/our current needs 25%
3. Happy to live at home 21%
4. Want to move out but can’t afford it 20%
5. My job isn’t secure enough to leave 20%
Matusik + AHURI.  Age group 25 to 34 years.  Multiple answers given.  2019 Survey.

These charts and table are something we shouldn’t be proud of.

In most places, today, more money is lent to investors than first home owners.

Western Australia and Northern Territory are the two current exceptions.

When I started in this business it was rare that investment loan totals exceeded that lent to first home buyers. Something is wrong here if you ask me.

The FHOG and FHOB was great politics but terrible house policy.

Ditto to the current proposed scheme.

They inflate prices, distort the building cycle and have helped reduce – dramatically – the proportion of first home buyers.

Many young adults are now stuck at home.  Burdens all round.

Those of us – with children in the 20s and 30s – should really hang our head in shame.  My bad too!

For the most part, we will leave our children (and probably our grandchildren too) worse off, economically, than we are.

We are the first generation, in over 200 years in this country, to achieve such a feat.

Little wonder why they the younger generation are starting protest?

But there's more...

Some observations

1. Between 50% and 60% of the money borrowed to buy housing in Australia is lent to second or subsequent owner residents. How the remaining monies – when excluding refinancing – is distributed between first home buyers and investors has changed dramatically over the last three decades.
Investors these days get the lion’s share.  Revisit chart 1.

2. Over the last 25 years some 110,000 households – on average across Australia each year – bought their first home each year.  Revisit chart 2.

3. In recent years there have been 4 investment loans to 1 first home buyer mortgage.
Given that some investors do not borrow to invest, this ratio is likely to be closer to 5 or 6 to 1. In the decade prior to the halving of capital gains tax in 2000, the ratio of investment mortgages to first home buyer loans was 2 to 1. And this relationship was largely 1 to 1 through the 1950s to late 1980s. Hand Drawing A Graph About Real Estate Market Concept Image

4. As a proportion of the 25 to 34 age household segment the first home buyer activity shown in chart 2 varied between 7% and 15% depending size of that segment and number of first home loans over the last 25 years.

5. Interestingly, the average in the 1990s and before any first home buyer assistance was 10%; during the 2000s when the First Home Owners Grant and subsequent Boost were introduced it averaged just 12% and since 2010, it has fallen back to 8%.  It rose to 15% during 2009 and was 11% in fiscal 2018.

6. Of note is that it took the GFC, in 2009, to see the highest number of first home buyer loans in any one year in Australia.  Also, in financial 2018, some 145,000 first home buyers secured a home loan.  Again, revisit chart 2.

7. So, when investors pulled out of the market like they did during the GFC and in more recent years, the banks filled the void, illustrating that loans to first home buyers can be done, it is just that, in my simple mind, investors crowd them out.

Looking forward

Forget the official definition of a recession, a large portion of Australia is already in an ‘income recession’ and many more are about to enter one.

At first glance, therefore, it makes perfect sense that the RBA cuts interest rates.

However, whilst the intention is to help boost employment, in reality, rate cuts incentivise businesses to invest in technology that displaces jobs. Interest Only Lending Australia

That displacement also includes moving local jobs, offshore.

As revenues fall, businesses are forced to find cost effective solutions and better use of technology is high up on the list, especially when tax rebates apply.

Taking a wider view, one of the major reasons why interest rates are low globally is because jobs are being displaced by automation, robotics, digitalisation and the internet of things.

And so, we are stuck in a vicious circle, where central banks cut rates, further incentivising investment in technology that displaces jobs, forcing central banks to cut rates further.

Of course, rate cuts also help lift the price of real estate which benefits those who already own assets but does nothing for those without such assets.  And so, rate cuts widen the inequality gap and really do hurt first home buyers.

The federal government’s planned first home deposit scheme, which starts in January next year and is income dependent plus capped at certain price points depending on location, will do little to really assist first home buyers.

In most part, house prices will rise beyond their capacity to borrow.

And besides all these schemes do is bring the activity forward - revisit chart 2one last time - and hence distort the normal building/property cycle.

What’s needed

Below are some things worth thinking about.

1. Get the ratio of first home loans to investment loans back to where it was in the early 1990s.  
This can be done by a carrot or a stick.

The carrot is incentivising financiers to do more business with first home buyers.

The stick is to place a brake on investment loans. 40327469_l

We need to stop artificially fuelling house price appreciation via first home grants, boosts and deposits.

2. We need to build more homes but the right type of homes. 

We need to encourage more appropriate dwelling forms across the country and especially in our middle ring suburbs.

3. Provide substantial tax cuts for those on lower to middle incomes. 

These earners spend a high proportion of their income and cutting their tax rates increases the flow of money through the economy.

Dropping interest rates, given the current circumstances, is having the opposite effect. Future Sydney Scenarios

4. More spending on appropriate infrastructure projects.

Llike the recently announced NSW school maintenance program or much needed new bridges crossing the Brisbane River.

Such initiatives are more immediate, more equitable in terms of benefits and employs more people than the typical big white elephant road or rail project.

5. Have the RBA meet once a year – in June say – and set a course for the year. 

If these cats cannot forecast and plan out the year ahead then let’s employ someone that can. We need fewer distractions, more focus and certainty.

About Michael is director of independent property advisory Matusik Property Insights. He is independent, perceptive and to the point; has helped over 550 new residential developments come to fruition and writes his insightful Matusik Missive
No comments

Guides

Copyright © 2024 Michael Yardney’s Property Investment Update Important Information
Content Marketing by GridConcepts