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Lending indicators

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This release is about new borrower-accepted finance commitments for housing, personal and business loans

Reference period
September 2022
Released
2/11/2022

Key statistics

In September 2022, new loan commitments (seasonally adjusted):

  • fell 8.2% for housing
  • fell 5.2% for personal fixed term loans
  • fell 36.6% for business construction (a typically volatile series)
  • fell 12.1% for business purchase of property (a typically volatile series)

Value of new borrower-accepted loan commitments (seasonally adjusted)

 Sep-2022 ($b)Month percent change (%)Year percent change (%)
Households
 Housing25.14-8.2-18.5
  Owner Occupier (a)16.81-9.3-19.9
  Investor (a)8.33-6.0-15.3
 Personal
  Fixed term loans2.18-5.210.3
Businesses
 Construction1.42-36.6-33.8
 Purchase of Property5.49-12.1-8.7
  1. Loan commitments for owner occupier, investor housing and personal fixed term loans exclude refinancing.

Reverting to concurrent adjustment and reinstating trend data

Commencing with the next issue for the October 2022 reference period which will be released on 2 Dec 2022, Lending Indicators will revert to concurrent seasonal adjustment from the current forward factors method and will also reinstate trend data. There will be no changes to the format of the publication data, e.g. download tables. For further information, see the notes titled "Seasonal adjustment methods" and "Suspension of trend series" below.

Important data quality notes

Seasonal adjustment methods

Suspension of trend series

Treatment of Buy Now Pay Later products in Personal finance

     

Housing finance

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms, the value of new loan commitments:

  • for total housing fell 8.2% to $25.1b, after a fall of 3.4% in August
  • for owner-occupier housing fell 9.3% to $16.8b but remained 23.2% higher than the pre-pandemic level seen in February 2020
  • for investor housing fell 6.0% to $8.3b but remained 59.8% higher than the pre-pandemic level seen in February 2020

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms, the value of external refinancing:

  • for total housing fell 8.2% but was 7.4% higher compared to a year ago
  • for owner-occupier housing fell 7.2% to $11.9b, after rising 2.8% to an all-time high of $12.8b in August
  • for investor housing fell 10.3% and was 6.3% lower compared to a year ago

Personal finance

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms, the value of new loan commitments:

  • for fixed term personal finance fell 5.2%, after a rise of 9.5% in August
  • for road vehicles fell 6.8%, after a rise of 17.7% in August
  • for personal investment fell 10.0%, after a fall of 7.6% in August

Business finance

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms, the value of new loan commitments:

  • for construction finance fell 36.6%, after a rise of 51.7% in August
  • for the purchase of property fell 12.1%, after a fall of 23.6% in August

These series can have volatile month-to-month movements as they are strongly affected by small numbers of high value loans.

Housing finance (detailed)

Value of new loan commitments by purpose (seasonally adjusted)

 Sep-2022 ($b)Month percent change (%)Year percent change (%)
 Owner occupier
  Total housing (a)16.81-9.3-19.9
   Construction of dwellings2.03-12.4-12.9
   Purchase of newly erected dwellings0.91-6.0-31.0
   Purchase of existing dwellings12.70-8.7-20.4
  First home buyers4.05-6.8-26.0
 Investor
  Total housing (a)8.33-6.0-15.3
    

Number of new loan commitments by purpose (seasonally adjusted)

 Sep-2022 (No.)Month percent change (%)Year percent change (%)
 Owner occupier
  Total housing (a) (b)
   Construction of dwellings3 682-9.9-22.0
   Purchase of newly erected dwellings1 592-7.9-33.0
   Purchase of existing dwellings21 705-7.6-20.9
  First home buyers8 485-8.3-29.2
 Investor
  Total housing (a) (b)   
  1. Housing includes loan commitments for dwellings, purchase of residential land and for alterations and additions.
  2. There is no seasonally adjusted or trend data available for the number of owner occupiers or investors for total housing as the data was collected from July 2019.

 

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms, the value of new loan commitments:

  • to owner occupiers fell 9.3%, after a fall of 2.7% in August
  • to investors fell 6.0%, after a fall of 4.8% in August

  

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms for owner-occupier housing, the value of new loan commitments:

  • for the purchase of existing dwellings fell 8.7% and was 20.4% lower compared to a year ago
  • for the construction of new dwellings fell 12.4% and was 12.9% lower compared to a year ago
  • for the purchase of new dwellings fell 6.0% and was 31.0% lower compared to a year ago
  1. For periods prior to July 2019, statistics about owner occupier commitments for residential land are modelled using data about the total value of  commitments for residential land.
  2. Hide/unhide series in the graph by clicking the legend above (toggle the 'purchase of existing dwellings' series for a closer look at the other purposes of owner occupier lending).

 

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms for owner-occupier housing, the value of new loan commitments:

  • in Victoria fell 10.4%, in Queensland fell 13.8%, in New South Wales fell 5.9%, in Western Australia fell 13.2%, in South Australia fell 7.0%, in the Australian Capital Territory fell 8.9%, in the Northern Territory fell 25.2% and in Tasmania fell 10.4%

  

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms for investor housing, the value of new loan commitments:

  • in New South Wales fell 8.3%, in Western Australia fell 8.7%, in Queensland fell 3.0%, in Victoria fell 1.7%, in Tasmania fell 26.6%, in the Australian Capital Territory fell 12.2% and in South Australia fell 1.3%
  • in the Northern Territory (a smaller and more volatile series) rose 20.6%

In September 2022, in original terms:

  • the value of new variable rate loan commitments funded in the month fell 9.3%
  • the value of new variable rate loan commitments to first home buyers funded in the month fell 5.1%
  • the value of new fixed rate loan commitments funded in the month fell 18.2%
  • the value of new fixed rate loan commitments to first home buyers funded in the month fell 26.4%
  1. A loan is considered funded once any portion of the funds is made available for the borrower to draw down according to the terms of the contract. This will occur after there is a borrower-accepted commitment to provide finance.
  2. Total Fixed rate and Total Variable rate housing loans include first home buyer loans

In September 2022 in original terms, average loan sizes for owner-occupier dwellings (including construction, purchase of new dwellings and existing dwellings):

  • fell slightly at the national level from $589k to $588k
  • had mixed movements across the states and territories
  1. Please note that while the series graphed above are joined between the available data points, there may be missing data points in between which are not available for publication

First home buyers

In September 2022 in seasonally adjusted terms for owner-occupier first home buyers, the number of new loan commitments:

  • at the national level fell 8.3% to 8,485, after a rise of 10.4% in August. The September level was 48.0% below the January 2021 high of 16,330.

  • in Queensland fell 12.3%, in Western Australia fell 15.6%, in Victoria fell 6.8%, in New South Wales fell 7.8%, in Tasmania fell 31.0%, in South Australia fell 8.0% and in the Australian Capital Territory fell 9.4%

  • in the Northern Territory was the same as the previous month

Additional information

  

New loan commitments to owner occupier first home buyers (original), number

 First home buyer loan commitments
Number
First home buyer ratio
Dwellings (a)
First home buyer ratio
Housing (b)
Total Australia8 59232.3%27.4%
New South Wales1 86228.0%23.4%
Victoria2 69836.1%30.9%
Queensland1 81331.0%25.9%
South Australia48626.1%21.2%
Western Australia1 25537.6%33.6%
Tasmania14327.8%22.7%
Northern Territory77NA31.2%
Australian Capital Territory258NA32.1%
  1. Dwellings includes loan commitments for construction of dwellings, purchase of newly erected dwellings and purchase of existing dwellings.
  2. Housing includes loan commitments for dwellings, purchase of residential land and for alterations and additions.

  

Data downloads

Housing Finance - Total

Data files

   

Housing Finance - Owner-occupiers

Data files

   

Housing Finance - Investors

Data files

  

Housing Finance - First home buyers

Data files

    

Table 26. Households; Housing finance; Non-residents; New loan commitments; Numbers and values

   

Personal Finance

Data files

   

Business Finance

Data files

Data cubes

Series ID concordance mapping

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 5601.0.

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