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RBNZ figures show that fewer than 15,000 mortgages were issued last month - easily a record low for a June since the data began being collected in 2013

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By David Hargreaves

If it seems quiet out there in housing market land - that's because it is.

The latest Reserve Bank monthly mortgage figures show that fewer than 15,000 mortgages were issued last month.

That's a record low for a June in the time this specific data has been collected - which is only since 2013. But it's a June record by some distance, beating the previous low of a little over 21,000 in that month in 2019.

In June 2020 - just after the lockdown - there were nearly 22,000 mortgages issued, while in the same month a year ago there were 26,000 as the market was at that time just beginning to lose its roar a little.

The June 2022 month follows a recent pattern of declining mortgage numbers issued. However till this month the decline has also been accompanied by a rising average size of mortgage.

Maybe with the rising interest rates we are seeing, some kind of limit has now been reached.

Last month the average-sized mortgage fell from the record high of $408,000 in May to $405,000 in June - but that figure is still nearly 24% higher than the average-sized mortgage in June 2021.

The total amount of money borrowed in June was just over $6 billion, which was well down on the massive $8.5 billion in the same month a year ago, but it compares reasonably with the around $5.4 billion both in June 2020 and June 2019.

First home buyers are keeping comparatively active in the market, borrowing over $1.1 billion in June 2022.

The average size of the FHB mortgages dropped as well, from the record high of $595,000 in May to $588,000 last month.

According to the RBNZ, the share of new mortgage commitments to first home buyers increased slightly, from 18.2% in May to 18.3% in June, while the share of new commitments to other owner occupiers decreased 1.1 percentage points from 64.2% to 63.1%. The share to investors increased from 16.6% in May to 17.4% in June. Investors borrowed just over $1 billion.

Separate quarterly figures for the period to June showed that mortgage credit grew by just a net $3.4 billion (to a total of $334.8 billion), which apart from the pandemic-affected June quarter in 2020 is the slowest growth in nearly four years.

As some means of comparison, the December quarter in 2020 saw mortgage credit rise by a net $9 billion.

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The RBNZ provided this summary of the June mortgage figures.

This story was originally published on Interest.co.nz and has been republished here with permission.