Weekend Reads — Must see articles from the last week

6 min readJun 3, 2016

There are more interesting articles, commentaries and analyst reports on the Web every week than anyone could read in a month.

Each Saturday morning I like to share some of the ones I’ve read during the week.

Monday will be here before you know it, so enjoy some weekend reading…and please forward to your friends by clicking the social link buttons.

APRA Figures Show Decline In Investor, High Risk Lending

Lending rules are about to get a whole lot more serious for investors, with latest reports showing billions of dollars worth of mortgages outstanding.

Your Investment Property magazine has released an article specifying figures and results that could see a change in high risk lending.

The effectiveness of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s (APRA) investor lending intervention has been further illustrated by the release of lending figures by the watchdog for the March 2016 quarter.

According to analysis of the APRA figures by CoreLogic RP Data, at the end of March there was $906.7b worth of mortgages outstanding to owner occupiers and $501.3b outstanding to investors, with total lending up 8.7% compared to March 2015.
The average outstanding mortgage balance was recorded at $251,900 at the end of March 2016, having increased by 4.8% year-on-year.
While total lending is up by a relatively significant mark over the year, investor lending has risen by just 0.1% in the 12 months to March 2016 while owner occupier lending has jumped 14% over the same period.
At the end of March the value of investor outstanding investor loans was 3.2% below the peak levels reached in June 2015 and investors accounted for 35.6% of outstanding loans, down from the peak 39% also recorded in June 2015.
Over the March 2016 quarter alone, there was $81.7 worth of new mortgages written, which is the lowest quarterly total since the three months to March 2014.

Find the full article here

Aussies slow with property technology + Why not to focus on auction clearances

Another great Real Estate Talk show produced by Kevin Turner.

Michael Yardney gives us an insight and a warning as well on what the Lower interest rates, the 2016 Budget and a Federal Election means for property

Andrew Mirams from Intuitive Finance explains what LMI or Lenders Mortgage Insurance is all about. [adrotate group=”8"]

Bernard Salt talks about how our living requirements have changed and the impact of that on our housing.

Nerida Conisbee from realestate.com.au tells us about a study amongst 28,000 highly engaged listings on their site they used to come up with Australia’s ideal home.

Pete Wargent explains why Australian investors are the least willing to embrace new technology when searching for an investment.

Jessica Darnborough gives us a look inside the Australian finance broking industry with some good advice about how to choose a broker.

If you don’t already subscribe to this excellent weekly Internet based radio show do so now by clicking here.

Business credit growth hits a 7 1/2 year high

The Australian economy is experiencing a wave of good news for business credit according to this blog from Pete Wargent.

More positive news for the economy as the Reserve Bank of Australia reported that annual credit growth expanded to 6.7 per cent, the strongest result since 2008.
The result was predominantly driven by business credit which rose by 7.4 per cent, itself an 87-month high.

Owner-occupier housing credit also continued to rise by 7.3 per cent, its strongest pace since August 2010.
On the other hand, housing credit growth to investors continues to fade, now down to just 6.5 per cent from a peak of 11 per cent as recently as June 2015.
This is well below the 10 per cent supervisory threshold for investor credit growth, potentially leaving some room for a rebound in this sector.
Total housing credit growth is consequently sliding back towards around 7 per cent per annum.

Growth in personal credit is going nowhere fast, having actually gone backwards over the year to April.
Something doesn’t stack up here — perhaps it’s related to the use of offset accounts and mortgage buffers? I don’t know.

Read the full article here

It takes just five days to become a qualified real estate agent in NSW, Victoria

Like with most professions, we hope that when we list out home with a real estate agent we are receiving a service from an experienced professional who has spent time studying his craft, and most of the time this is true.

But as reported in a article from News.com.au, there is a new wave of ‘dodgy’ agents who are being trained in as less as 5 days.

IMAGINE putting your property dream in the hands of a real estate agent who’s had less training than a person making a cup of coffee.

That’s what’s happening in New South Wales and Victoria and it’s putting property owners and investors at risk of dodgy deals as some agents brag about being about to speed through training programs faster than it takes to become a qualified barista.
Industry leaders say some agents are making big mistakes, such as breaching client and customer privacy, by doing things that imply they haven’t spent enough time studying the rules or the law.
John Cunningham, managing director of the Real Estate Institute of New South Wales, said he recently experienced a situation where an agent breached his privacy at an auction by telling another prospective buyer his name and also lying about his interest in a property in order to build up competitive sales pressure.
Another source, who asked not to be named, told news.com.au that an agent in Sydney’s Northern Beaches disclosed his name to a client selling a property, allowing the seller to research him to decide whether or not to send him a sales contract.

Click here for the full article

Ten habits of people who always have a clean home

For most of us keeping the house clean is a job for the weekend, then come Monday we’re back at square one.

But what if we could obtain a few helpful habits to keep the home clean all year long?

An article from Domain.com.au ensures that you home will never see mess again.

For some, keeping a clean home can feel daunting, but for others like myself, it has become second nature.
Have I always been this way?
Absolutely not.
But by making way for new routines, my every day life at home has shifted for the better.
So, if you consider yourself a messy person and would like to trial what life is like in a calm, organised home, why not adopt these 10 habits of tidy people.