In total ANZ had on its books about $173.87 billion in owner occupier mortgages at the end of August, down from $174.6 billion, according to the latest APRA statistics.

This is despite other big four banks increasing their loan portfolio to owner occupiers by between one and three billion dollars.

While investor lending has remained fairly steady, this follows ANZ's leak of about $1 billion in owner occupier mortgages from June through July.

ANZ is reportedly not growing its mortgage book due to blown-out loan approval times as long as six weeks.

This was at a "level we weren't happy with", according to comments made by ANZ executive Mark Hand last month.

The latest data from PEXA also shows there were 590,461 new loans settled in the past 12 months, with the major banks collectively leading the charge.

Conversely, non-bank lenders leaked customers, down 22,500 collectively during the same period.

This could be attributed to the Reserve Bank's Term Funding Facility driving sharp loan deals for banks at the exclusion of non-banks.

Mortgage deferrals double

APRA data showed there was $11.9 billion worth of loans deferred at the end of August - up from $5.6 billion in July.

The percentage of the total Australian loan book deferred is up to 0.5% from 0.3%. 

For housing loans, 23,443 were deferred, amounting to $10.8 billion or 0.7% of total loans.

NSW made up the bulk of housing loans deferred, nearly doubling from 0.73% of the total state loan book in July to 1.39% in August.

Victoria's went from 0.18% to 0.43%.

However, this is significantly below levels seen in mid-2020, where more than one in ten loans were deferred to the value of more than $200 billion.

That said, APRA has lifted the threshold for deferral reporting to $50 million and 50 facilities in loan deferral, up from $20 million and 20 facilities in 2020.

The most notable absentee from APRA's institution-level data is ANZ.

Home loan 'ticking time bomb'

Following regulators' signals they will clamp down on the mortgage lending surge to keep Australia's finance sector stable, there are growing concerns any potential restrictions could target the wrong people.

"There is a very fine line between tightening lending standards for financial stability and taking away the opportunity for first home buyers to get into the market when they have a chance," said Brodie Haupt, CEO of digital lender WLTH.

"In the past, property investors were the usual suspects for inflated house prices, but the first home buyers are the ones flooding the market this time."

"In the end, informing new home buyers is key. It should be emphasised that we are in a low-interest environment at the moment, but it can't remain in the long-term."

Mr Haupt also pointed towards some of the challenges that home buyers could consequently face in the next few years should there be a 'credit crackdown'.

"The amount of credit growth outpacing a rise in household income is often referred to as a 'ticking time bomb' until interest rates inevitably increase," he said.

"There is talk of limiting how much banks can lend to borrowers with high debt-to-income ratios and high loan-to-valuation ratios, plus increasing interest rate servicing buffers, all to reduce the amount of debt in the country."

CommBank has already increased its serviceability buffer from 5.1% to 5.25%.

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Important Information and Comparison Rate Warning

Base criteria of: a $400,000 loan amount, variable, fixed, principal and interest (P&I) home loans with an LVR (loan-to-value) ratio of at least 80%. However, the ‘Compare Home Loans’ table allows for calculations to be made on variables as selected and input by the user. Some products will be marked as promoted, featured or sponsored and may appear prominently in the tables regardless of their attributes. All products will list the LVR with the product and rate which are clearly published on the product provider’s website. Monthly repayments, once the base criteria are altered by the user, will be based on the selected products’ advertised rates and determined by the loan amount, repayment type, loan term and LVR as input by the user/you. *The Comparison rate is based on a $150,000 loan over 25 years. Warning: this comparison rate is true only for this example and may not include all fees and charges. Different terms, fees or other loan amounts might result in a different comparison rate. Rates correct as of . View disclaimer.

Photo by Mick Haupt on Unsplash



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