Good Morning and Happy Monday!
Another busy week in the world of money as we lead up to the end of FY19-20. I missed the eclipse last night sadly due to the cloud cover. There were some really cool pics I found this morning https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53120704 Being the longest day of the year (winter solstice) over the weekend means we are on the run back to Spring! Hahah
A headline you have no doubt seen during the week was the rise in the jobless rate. Terrible times indeed for many Australians. We can only hope that with some restrictions easing that this is very temporary. Late last week the ACT Govt announced their changes I their 2.2 recovery plan. Which makes our new normal nearly normal.
There were several other reports over the week, around housing prices dropping with chicken little headlines of ‘the sky is falling’.
Yet as one reads further into one of the articles it notes the drop in house prices nationally was only 0.4%, with sales activity bouncing back to 18.3% from 33% in April. I know here in Canberra our bubble has hardly noticed a blip, unless valuers are to be believed. That is another story altogether.. There are other concerns as Sydney’s vacancy rate jumps to 16%, with 4% state-wide.
Banks on then flip side of all of this have continued to confuse. As quick as ING announced their 2.09% they also announced a rate hike, moving to 2.19%. Matching NAB’s cut this week on their 2 year fixed at 2.19%. I would think that ING have raised the rate because they cant deal with the volume coming through the door. This is not unusual for lender to do when either their books are full of a certain kind of led or their SLA’s are about to blow out. I think we will continue to see lenders jockey for position as the refinancing market continues to boom.
I hope you all have a great week, reach out if you need anything from a scenario to a property report.
JC
Scenarios and interest rates quoted above are suggestions and constitute general advice only.
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