However, housing loans fall by 4.1%
The average mortgage size in Australia has reached a historic high, according to new data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Its lending indicator data for December 2023 has shown that the national average new mortgage size stood at a record $624,383.
The figures also indicated an increase in loan sizes for each state and territory compared to November, with Queensland ($572,439), South Australia ($519,478), and Western Australia ($509,275) surpassing their respective state-based records.
South Australia saw a significant 11.2% rise in mortgage size since the RBA began to hike rates. In contrast, Victoria saw a 3.8% decrease in mortgage size over the same period.
Despite New South Wales observing a slight decline from its peak mortgage size of $803,235 recorded in January 2022, it still maintains the highest average new mortgage size across Australia, standing at $785,405.
However, while people were taking out larger mortgages, there was also a sharp decline in new loan commitments for first-home buyers during December, falling 8.4% after a rise of 4% in November.
The total value of new loan commitments for housing also fell by 4.1% in December, owner-occupier loan commitments dropped by 5.6%, and investor loan commitments fell by 1.3%.
“While the value of investor and owner-occupier loans fell in the month of December, through the year, growth was 20.4% for investor loans and 7.4% for owner-occupier loans,” said Mish Tan (pictured), head of finance statistics at the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
“The composition of total loan activity has changed since the data was first collected in 2019. The proportion of loans to investors has increased from 27.3% in December 2019 to 35.5% in December 2023.”
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