Loan settlements strongest among mutuals

The digital property settlement platform developed the quarterly report to provide "useful and timely insights" to optimise the settlement experience for home buyers and other stakeholders involved in a property transaction.

More than 133,000 settlements were analysed in the June 2022 quarter, using the platform’s settled first date (SFD) metric to measure the performance of lenders and practitioners involved in settling property sales on their scheduled day.

Of the lenders analysed, customer-owned banks performed the strongest, with an average SFD of 89.2 per cent, followed by foreign ADIs at 88.2 per cent.

More than 85 per cent of major banks, other domestic banks and major bank subsidiaries that PEXA analysed reported settlements for property sales on the first scheduled date (87.5 per cent, 87.3 per cent and 85.1 per cent, respectively), while local non-bank lenders lagged behind at 79 per cent.

Across the five mainland states reported, all reported results above 80 per cent.

Lenders in Victoria recorded the highest average settlements at 87.6 per cent. Queensland followed closely at 87.4 per cent, NSW reported 85.9 per cent, 83.5 per cent in Western Australia, while lenders in South Australia trailed the other states with an average result of 81 per cent.

As outlined in PEXA Insights’ recent property mortgage report, competition for new loans is very strong across all mainland states, however, there has been a marked change in the country’s borrowing appetite over the past 12 months.

The results, which use the PEXA Exchange, provided a glimpse of the experience of Australian buyers, PEXA’s chief marketing and financial institutions officer Marielle Yeoh said.

“It is in the best interests of all stakeholders within the property eco-system to get people into their homes on time,” Ms Yeoh said.

“This new metric is a significant step forward towards ensuring the industry is working together to deliver for the most important stakeholders in a property transaction – the buyer and seller.

“It is our mission to ensure settlements are finalised as planned, however we do acknowledge that settlement dates are sometimes changed based on the request of a buyer and/or seller.

“PEXA is continuing to work collaboratively with lenders and practitioners to drive the benefits of digital conveyancing, identifying further system and process enhancements to ensure these high levels of Settled First Date continue.”

[Related: New mortgages lift nationally over June: PEXA]