Improving labour market to aid property recovery
Rising employment across Australia could spur investor confidence and further boost the already strong house prices, an expert has said.
Latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) found that employment has successfully recovered to pre-COVID levels nationally, with full-time employment increasing by 89,000 people between January and February to surpass 13 million people.
In fact, the current status of full-time employment is 4,000 people higher than in March 2020, ABS head of labour statistics Bjorn Jarvis confirmed.
According to Archistar chief economist Dr Andrew Wilson, the strong improvement across the labour market bodes well for the recovery of the property market.
With capital city housing markets already seeing strong buyer demand and rising prices, the employment growth could further “enhance housing affordability and confidence, adding upward pressure on already strongly growing prices,” Dr Wilson said.
Recent CoreLogic data indicates that property values are rising at the highest level since 2003. Moreover, Sydney prices are now at an all-time high, having broken a value record set back in 2017.
Looking ahead, Dr Wilson said that although JobKeeper’s end is expected to disturb the labour market and send ripples through the economy, he believes that the impacts will be less severe than anticipated.
“Concerns over the possible significant negative impact on the economy of the tapering of the JobKeeper allowances at the end of this month will also likely to be to be misplaced – again,” he highlighted.
At the moment, NSW and Victoria have the lowest unemployment rate at 5.6 per cent, further cementing the states’ recovery from the impacts of COVID-19.
This is followed by Western Australia with 6.0 per cent, Queensland with 6.1 per cent and South Australia with 6.8 per cent.
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