Negative equity builds across Oz

Newly published data suggests a rising number of Australian real estate owners are living with negative equity.

According to a report supplied by RP Data the last three months of 2011 saw an increase in the number of residential real estate owners residing in a property that is worth less than they paid for it – people who have bought in the last couple of years are more likely to be affected.

The report shows that more than a quarter of all people living with negative equity have owned the property for less than two years whereas owners that had purchased their home more than nine years ago totalled less than one per cent of the complete figure.

Falling house prices over the last fourteen months is said to be a major cause for the rise in negative equity levels and some areas have been harder hit. Up to twenty per cent of homes on the Sunshine and Gold coasts are now worth less than the purchase price in contrast less than 4 per cent of residential property in Sydney is affected.