ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence dropped 1.2 points to 82.6 this week, with homeowners driving the dip.
Analysis by housing status showed the biggest drop was for people who own their own home - down 5.2 points in a week. Consumer confidence for homeowners is now at its lowest so far this year.
The index overall has now spent a record 54 straight weeks below the mark of 85. Consumer confidence is now 4.5 points above the same week a year ago, but 1.2 points below the 2024 weekly average of 83.8.
ANZ senior economist Adelaide Timbrell said despite the decrease in consumer confidence, it was still above all results from mid-February to December 2023.
“Short term economic confidence rose to its highest level since April 2022, before the RBA hiking cycle began,” Timbrell said. “Those paying off their homes had higher confidence in the week, presumably due to the RBA holding rates again in February, while outright homeowners (who often benefit from higher interest rates) had slightly lower confidence through the week.
“The RBA Board continued its tightening bias in its post meeting statement and Governor Bullock reiterated in the RBA press conference that the Board was not ‘ruling anything in or out.’”
There were mixed results around the states with consumer confidence up in Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia but down in both New South Wales and Queensland.
Now just under a fifth of Australians (19% - down 2ppts) say their families are ‘better off’ financially than this time last year compared to 52% (unchanged) that say their families are ‘worse off’.
Just under a third (32% - down 1ppt) expect their family to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year while 34% (up 1ppt) expect to be ‘worse off’.
Meanwhile, 12% (up 1ppt) expect ‘good times’ for the Australian economy over the next twelve months compared to 29% (down 1ppt) that expect ‘bad times’. Both figures are at their highest and lowest points respectively since 2022.
Looking further ahead, 13% (down 1ppt) of Australians are expecting ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 18% (down 1ppt) expecting ‘bad times’.
Buying intentions were weakened this week with 21% (down 2ppts) of Australians saying now is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items while 51% (up 2ppts) say now is a ‘bad time to buy’.