Sydney property prices, the bellwether for the Australian market, climbed for a second straight month in March in a positive sign for nationwide home values that have been hammered by soaring interest rates.
(Bloomberg) — Sydney property prices, the bellwether for the Australian market, climbed for a second straight month in March in a positive sign for nationwide home values that have been hammered by soaring interest rates.
Prices in Sydney rose 1.4% last month after advancing 0.3% in February, data from property consultancy CoreLogic Inc. showed Monday. Still, they remain down 12.1% for the 12 months ended March.
Melbourne and Brisbane posted more modest gains last month and the combined capital cities index increased by 0.8%.
Signs of stabilization in the housing market will be welcomed by the nation’s central bank as it tries to engineer a soft landing in its struggle to bring down inflation. The Reserve Bank of Australia feared a possible 20% peak-to-trough drop by the end of 2024, in a worst case scenario presented in an analysis last year.
Monday’s data showed a 9% decline from the April 2022 peak in the national capital city index, CoreLogic said. The drop came as the RBA delivered its most aggressive tightening cycle since 1989, driving up borrowing costs by 3.5 percentage points between May and March to tamp down consumer prices.
The RBA is expected to pause tightening on Tuesday after 10 consecutive hikes, money market pricing shows. Economists, meanwhile, are split: Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Westpac Banking Corp. expect it to stand pat at 3.6%, while ANZ Bank and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. see another quarter-point hike.
Low supply levels, tight rental markets and increased demand from overseas migration were supporting house prices, said Tim Lawless, research director at CoreLogic.
“Although interest rates are high and there is an expectation the economy will slow through the year, it’s clear other factors are now placing upwards pressure on home prices,” Lawless said.
Still, borrowing costs are expected to remain elevated until at least late 2024 as inflation remains sticky, which could weigh on any growth.
“We might see a pretty sustained period of higher rates before we see cuts,” said Peng Yew Wong, a senior lecturer at RMIT University in Melbourne. “That means borrowers will need to pay higher repayments.”
“So that is a factor that will weigh on the market despite the positive from population growth and housing shortage,” Wong added. “It’s hard to tell.”
Affordability and supply are likely to remain challenging for some time, Australia’s National Housing Finance and Investment Corp. said in a separate report released Monday.
“The rapid return of population growth is coinciding with the fastest increases in interest rates for several decades, undermining residential construction feasibilities and weakening the pipeline of new housing,” the NHFIC said in a statement.
Tight supply of labor and materials, and bad weather, had also impacted housing construction in Australia, it said. The NHFIC is forecasting a recovery in housing supply after 2025-26 as macroeconomic conditions shift.
–With assistance from Sam Nagarajan.
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