Australian Property

It has been a year since the Albanese government introduced its 5% deposit scheme for first home buyers, which lets them buy a home with only a 5% deposit, with taxpayers guaranteeing 15% of the purchase price and avoiding lenders’ mortgage insurance.

State budgets are the biggest losers from what is shaping up to be the nation’s greatest housing correction in modern history.

The Reserve Bank’s latest interest rate hike has dealt a hammer blow to the property market.

The latest dwelling construction data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), released on Wednesday, revealed that only 180,546 homes were completed in the June 2026 year, 59,454 (25%) fewer than the National Housing Accord’s annual target of 240,000 dwellings a year.

As falling housing prices continue to spread to a growing share of the nation’s housing markets, downward revisions to price performance in various locales increasingly feel like par for the course.

One Nation released an analysis showing that its promised 766,000 cuts to temporary migrant numbers back to 2017 levels would lower rents by $54 a week, or $2,818 a year.

Most fanfare and concern have focused on the sharp decline in Australian dwelling values, which have fallen 6.8% from their April peak across the five major capital city markets.

According to The Australian’s Mackenzie Scott, more than 102,000 Australians have used the federal government’s 5% first-home buyer (FHB) deposit scheme since it was expanded on 1 October 2025.

To date, Australia’s housing correction has been driven by the two largest capital cities, Sydney and Melbourne.

Auction clearance rates have historically been a strong leading indicator of dwelling value growth, especially in major capital city markets.

Roy Morgan’s latest mortgage stress survey shows that 32.3% of mortgage households were at risk of mortgage stress in August, with 22.7% extremely at risk: Mortgage stress was tracking at its highest levels since the peak of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in mid-2008, when the official cash rate hit 7%.

As commentators and banks alike continue to revise housing price forecasts down, Australians are increasingly wondering how much further prices could fall.

The latest dwelling completions data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed that only 173,400 homes were built in the year to March 2026, 66,600 (28%) fewer than the 240,000 annual run rate required to meet the National Housing Accord’s target of building 1.2 million homes over five years.

The private credit market, which has grown to around $200 billion in assets, has become a key lender to developers as traditional banks pull back from construction lending due to tightening risk appetites.

Cotality’s September housing market results are out: the nation’s rental market saw a solid rise in the vacancy rate to 2%, up from the record low of 1.5% recorded in February 2026 and the highest level since January 2025.

Just when you thought that Australia’s housing correction couldn’t get worse, Cotality has revised its dwelling values index downward, meaning that values have fallen more sharply than expected.

Australia ranks near the top in the world for household wealth.

As falling housing prices continue to spread to more and more markets across the nation, the eyes of the public and of property analysts is often fixed on the various price indices measuring the decline.

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will hand down its interest rate decision later today, with financial markets and economists widely tipping a 0.25% increase in the official cash rate (OCR).

New national polling shows Australians have lost confidence across the entire housing market — buyers, sellers, renters and investors alike — reflecting deep financial stress, falling prices, and expectations of further RBA rate rises.