Interest Rates - Australia

Home loan switch could cause economic headaches as housing screws tighten

https://first2move.com.au 

The big switch is on in the mortgage market.

Key points:

In past six months $36bn of mortgages switched from interest-only to principal and interest loans

The switch adds up to an extra 50 per cent to loan repayments

APRA likely to tighten lending rules further, targeting loans to home buyers with little surplus cash flow

In just the past six months the amount of interest-only (IO) loans held by the banks have dropped by around $36 billion, according the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.

APRA can feel pretty chuffed with the result. It is exactly what it wanted in its push to de-risk banks' balance sheet by quelling the speculative bravado of investors.

But there are obvious side effects in targeting interest-only loans.

They are the instrument of choice for not only investors biding their time in the tax haven provided by negative gearing to make a windfall gain on capital appreciation.

They are also used by maxed-out borrowers repaying as little as possible, hoping for a bit of financial headroom if wages pick up.

Unfortunately wages show no sign of picking up.

As the 19th century Prussian Field Marshall Helmuth Graf von Moltke once noted, "No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy", and APRA's insurgency has the IO brigade scampering in retreat.

It is a retreat that will further cripple the spending power of cash-strapped households and has profound implications for the Australian economy, according to the big Swiss investment bank, UBS.

(Source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation )