First home buyer loans rise by 6.8 per cent

Media Release

Released

11/02/2026

Source

Lending indicators, December Quarter 2025

Release date and time

11/02/2026 11:30am AEDT

The number of new first home buyer loans rose 6.8 per cent to 31,783 in December quarter 2025, according to data released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

Dr Mish Tan, ABS head of finance statistics said, ‘There was strong growth across all borrower-types this quarter. The number of first home buyer loans rose 6.8 per cent, investor loan numbers rose 5.5 per cent and the number of owner-occupier non-first home buyer loans rose 3.6 percent.’

‘This was the largest rise in the number of first home buyer loans since the December quarter 2023, and their value increased by 15.5 percent.’

Changes to policies supporting first home-buyers this quarter include the expansion of the Australian Government 5% Deposit Scheme and the introduction of the Australian Government Help to Buy Scheme.

Number of new loan commitments for dwellings (a), seasonally adjusted, Australia
	Total dwellings (seasadj) (no.)	Owner occupier (seasadj) (no.)	Investor (seasadj) (no.)
Dec-15	NA	86,394	NA
Mar-16	NA	84,630	NA
Jun-16	NA	88,784	NA
Sep-16	NA	82,569	NA
Dec-16	NA	84,147	NA
Mar-17	NA	89,498	NA
Jun-17	NA	90,155	NA
Sep-17	NA	93,218	NA
Dec-17	NA	89,488	NA
Mar-18	NA	87,108	NA
Jun-18	NA	86,804	NA
Sep-18	NA	83,329	NA
Dec-18	NA	80,865	NA
Mar-19	NA	75,200	NA
Jun-19	NA	73,445	NA
Sep-19	108,315	77,189	31,127
Dec-19	111,866	80,397	31,470
Mar-20	109,522	79,848	29,674
Jun-20	94,892	70,788	24,104
Sep-20	119,696	90,512	29,184
Dec-20	134,845	102,937	31,908
Mar-21	156,394	118,453	37,942
Jun-21	158,594	115,345	43,249
Sep-21	158,273	108,805	49,468
Dec-21	155,726	103,268	52,458
Mar-22	153,068	100,004	53,064
Jun-22	142,587	93,606	48,980
Sep-22	129,412	86,187	43,226
Dec-22	116,401	77,026	39,376
Mar-23	109,727	72,907	36,819
Jun-23	116,406	77,474	38,932
Sep-23	115,729	75,791	39,938
Dec-23	122,574	79,393	43,181
Mar-24	120,526	76,327	44,200
Jun-24	133,513	83,566	49,947
Sep-24	134,601	83,575	51,026
Dec-24	131,735	82,838	48,897
Mar-25	128,255	79,787	48,468
Jun-25	134,566	83,902	50,665
Sep-25	142,216	84,947	57,269
Dec-25	149,434	88,990	60,445

Number of new loan commitments for dwellings (a), seasonally adjusted, Australia

[" ","Total dwellings (seasadj)","Owner occupier (seasadj)","Investor (seasadj)"]

[["Dec-15","Mar-16","Jun-16","Sep-16","Dec-16","Mar-17","Jun-17","Sep-17","Dec-17","Mar-18","Jun-18","Sep-18","Dec-18","Mar-19","Jun-19","Sep-19","Dec-19","Mar-20","Jun-20","Sep-20","Dec-20","Mar-21","Jun-21","Sep-21","Dec-21","Mar-22","Jun-22","Sep-22","Dec-22","Mar-23","Jun-23","Sep-23","Dec-23","Mar-24","Jun-24","Sep-24","Dec-24","Mar-25","Jun-25","Sep-25","Dec-25"],[[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[108315],[111866],[109522],[94892],[119696],[134845],[156394],[158594],[158273],[155726],[153068],[142587],[129412],[116401],[109727],[116406],[115729],[122574],[120526],[133513],[134601],[131735],[128255],[134566],[142216],[149434]],[[86394],[84630],[88784],[82569],[84147],[89498],[90155],[93218],[89488],[87108],[86804],[83329],[80865],[75200],[73445],[77189],[80397],[79848],[70788],[90512],[102937],[118453],[115345],[108805],[103268],[100004],[93606],[86187],[77026],[72907],[77474],[75791],[79393],[76327],[83566],[83575],[82838],[79787],[83902],[84947],[88990]],[[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[null],[31127],[31470],[29674],[24104],[29184],[31908],[37942],[43249],[49468],[52458],[53064],[48980],[43226],[39376],[36819],[38932],[39938],[43181],[44200],[49947],[51026],[48897],[48468],[50665],[57269],[60445]]]

[]

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All series exclude refinancing.
Some series only commenced collection in the September quarter 2019 with the introduction of the Economic and Financial Statistics collection.
Loan commitments for dwellings includes loans for the purpose of ‘Construction of new dwellings’, ‘Purchase of new dwellings’ and ‘Purchase of existing dwellings’. 'Residential land' and 'Alterations and additions' are available as separate series.

Number of new first home buyer loan commitments (a), seasonally adjusted, Australia
	Owner occupier first home buyers (seasadj) (no.)
Dec-15	19,968
Mar-16	20,297
Jun-16	21,300
Sep-16	20,024
Dec-16	20,010
Mar-17	20,851
Jun-17	21,579
Sep-17	26,341
Dec-17	26,615
Mar-18	26,466
Jun-18	26,065
Sep-18	25,898
Dec-18	24,744
Mar-19	23,587
Jun-19	24,217
Sep-19	26,910
Dec-19	28,550
Mar-20	29,042
Jun-20	26,950
Sep-20	37,938
Dec-20	42,516
Mar-21	48,161
Jun-21	42,805
Sep-21	37,971
Dec-21	35,157
Mar-22	33,340
Jun-22	30,812
Sep-22	28,799
Dec-22	26,160
Mar-23	26,441
Jun-23	27,972
Sep-23	27,046
Dec-23	29,359
Mar-24	28,313
Jun-24	29,897
Sep-24	29,468
Dec-24	29,134
Mar-25	28,533
Jun-25	29,319
Sep-25	29,772
Dec-25	31,783

Number of new first home buyer loan commitments (a), seasonally adjusted, Australia

["","Owner occupier first home buyers (seasadj)"]

[["Dec-15","Mar-16","Jun-16","Sep-16","Dec-16","Mar-17","Jun-17","Sep-17","Dec-17","Mar-18","Jun-18","Sep-18","Dec-18","Mar-19","Jun-19","Sep-19","Dec-19","Mar-20","Jun-20","Sep-20","Dec-20","Mar-21","Jun-21","Sep-21","Dec-21","Mar-22","Jun-22","Sep-22","Dec-22","Mar-23","Jun-23","Sep-23","Dec-23","Mar-24","Jun-24","Sep-24","Dec-24","Mar-25","Jun-25","Sep-25","Dec-25"],[[19968],[20297],[21300],[20024],[20010],[20851],[21579],[26341],[26615],[26466],[26065],[25898],[24744],[23587],[24217],[26910],[28550],[29042],[26950],[37938],[42516],[48161],[42805],[37971],[35157],[33340],[30812],[28799],[26160],[26441],[27972],[27046],[29359],[28313],[29897],[29468],[29134],[28533],[29319],[29772],[31783]]]

[]

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Owner occupiers only

First home buyer loans rose by 6.8 per cent

The number of first home buyer owner-occupied loans rose by 2,011 loans (6.8 per cent) to 31,783 in the December quarter, and 9.1 per cent through the year.

There were rises in New South Wales (10.9 per cent), Queensland (6.4 per cent), Victoria (3.5 per cent), Western Australia (9.8 per cent), South Australia (4.8 per cent), Australian Capital Territory (7.1 per cent) and Northern Territory (3.2 per cent), while there was a fall in Tasmania (-1.7 per cent).

‘The size of the average first home buyer loan rose by a record 8.5 per cent to $607,624 this quarter and was largely driven by first home buyers in NSW. The Australian Government 5% Deposit Scheme has increased the eligibility criteria for first home buyers and we are seeing the early effects of this in our data.’ Dr Tan said.

New investment loans reached record number and value

There were 60,445 new investment loans approved in the December quarter 2025, a 5.5 per cent (3,176 loans) rise compared to the previous quarter, and 23.6 per cent higher than the December quarter 2024. The total value of new investment loans was $43.0 billion in the December quarter, a rise of 7.9 per cent ($3.2 billion). The average loan size rose over the quarter by $31,008 to $716,711.

There was growth in the number of investment loans across all states: Victoria (8.8 per cent), New South Wales (4.1 per cent), Queensland (3.3 per cent), Western Australia (4.6 per cent), Tasmania (28.2 per cent) and South Australia (2.8 per cent). There were falls across the territories: The Northern Territory (-9.3 per cent) and the Australian Capital Territory* (-4.3 per cent).

*The number of investment loans in the Australian Capital Territory is not seasonally adjusted.

Media notes

All figures are seasonally adjusted unless noted otherwise.
Lending Indicators reverted to concurrent seasonal adjustment in the October 2022 release. This method of seasonal adjustment will result in revisions to historical data each month. For more information, see the methodology page
For any media requests, email media@abs.gov.au or call 1300 175 070 (9am–5pm Canberra time) with your questions and deadline.
Please attribute the 'Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)' when using our data.
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Information on how the ABS will release market sensitive releases during a website or API outage.

APA

Citation

First home buyer loans rise by 6.8 per cent

APA

Citation

First home buyer loans rose by 6.8 per cent

New investment loans reached record number and value

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