Sales of new australian homes edge upwards

Photo: Chanc

The HIA New Home Sales Report, a survey of Australia’s largest volume builders, showed a modest rise of 3 per cent for the month of October, which was driven by detached home sales in Victoria and Western Australia.

"After a relatively sharp decline of 5.7 per cent in July... total new home sales have mounted a modest recovery,” notes HIA Chief Economist, Dr Harley Dale. "Sales are still off their cyclical peak reached back in April this year, but the overall volume of new home sales is still at an elevated level. That augurs well for healthy new home construction activity persisting into 2015."

In the month of October 2014 detached house sales increased by 4.7 per cent in Victoria and by 24.8 per cent in WA. Detached house sales fell by 3.0 per cent in New South Wales and were down by 7.8 per cent in Queensland and 1.7 per cent in South Australia. Over the three months to October 2014 detached house sales increased in NSW (3.7 per cent), Queensland (1.2 per cent) and WA (1.7 per
cent), but fell in Victoria (13.4 per cent) and SA (6.3 per cent).

"Australia is on track to commence a record number of homes this year," adds Dale. "While undesirable lags in the availability of ABS data prevent confirmation of this outcome until well into next year, the fact is that 2014 is drawing to a close. We now want to be seeing evidence pointing to a healthy prognosis for new home building activity in 2015. In this regard we have positive signals coming from three key leading indicators. HIA new home sales and ABS building approvals are past their peaks but remain at elevated levels."