Melbourne has closed the gap on Sydney on a measure few home buyers will be happy with.
Skyrocketing house prices have increased mortgage pressure on Melbourne's first-home buyers to levels comparable with those of Sydney.
More than half of Melbourne's first-home buyers pay more than 30 per cent of their disposable income, defined as the tipping point for mortgage pressure, on housing costs.
Over the past decade mortgage pressure remained stable in Sydney at 56 per cent of first-home buyers but increased dramatically in Melbourne to 53 per cent, compared with 36 per cent a decade ago.Advertisement: Story continues below
A report by the Canberra University affiliated National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling shows Brisbane recorded increases similar to those of Melbourne, while Perth and Adelaide remain somewhat more affordable. In Melbourn the median house price had grown 138 per cent over 10 years to $470,000, said the report's author, Ben Phillips.
Over the same period ''disposable incomes for households have increased by only 58 per cent, so there's this massive disconnect between house prices and incomes'', Mr Phillips said. The high cost of buying meant there were fewer first-home buyers - down 12 per cent over the decade - and more would-be-purchasers in the rental market, he said.
About 80 per cent of the Consumer Action Law Centre's clients were suffering from mortgage or rental stress, said Penelope Hill, a MoneyHelp manager. Overcommitment was the biggest issue for young people entering the property market, she said.
Arthur Karabatsos, a Moody's Investor Services analyst, said invariably the more people borrowed against a house, the more likely they were to default. Recent Moody's research shows borrowers in Melbourne's eastern suburbs who were more than 90 days behind in mortgage repayments had an average loan-to-value ratio of 85 per cent.
Higher house prices, the scrapping of first-home buyer bonuses and possibility of higher interest rates suggested a bleak future for first-home buyers, Mr Phillips said. The Economist has for the second time rated Australian house prices as the most overvalued. ''That makes it all the more surprising [the] central bank opted not to increase its benchmark interest rate this month,'' it said.