Property Brief - May 2023

The first four months of 2023 saw a marginal improvement in the number of new home loan applications. However, the property market is likely to remain subdued until interest rates stabilise and start going down again. The pandemic-induced dip in bond applications in Q2 2020 is plain to see on the graph below. So too, the spike that occurred immediately afterwards, due to pent-up demand and the initial easing of lockdown restrictions. After that, the upward trend in home loan applications continued for another four quarters until a modest decline set in when the Reserve Bank started raising interest rates.