Australia: Housing market sentiment

Houses & Holes writes:

The Westpac Red Book for October is out and paints a picture of housing market sentiment turning strongly upwards: One of the highlights in last month’s survey was a big 9.6% jump in the sub-index tracking views on ‘time to buy a dwelling’ to the highest level since Sep 2009…….

I am as skeptical as he is of the conclusion that the housing market is about to recover: “Unemployment is not done with us yet.” If you took a survey of the major banks I would be surprised to find, with lending margins squeezed and the end of the mining investment boom approaching, that any of them are planning to aggressively expand mortgage lending in the current climate.

via Red book paints housing sentiment breakout | MacroBusiness.