In this month’s newsletter, you’ll find the latest news about the mortgage and property markets, as well as some handy tips about buying a property when you’re single:

- Housing assistance extended
- Building approvals rise 5.5%
- How to buy when you're single
- Average home loan reaches $627k

Another 50,000 places have been made available for the federal government's Home Guarantee Scheme (HGS) for the period 1 July 2024 to 30 June 2025. The HGS includes the First Home Guarantee, which gives eligible first home buyers the opportunity to purchase a property with a 5% deposit, without having to pay lender's mortgage insurance (LMI). A total of 35,000 places are available.

The federal government's plan to facilitate the construction of 1.2 million homes in five years officially started on 1 July. But the latest home-building approvals figures suggest the government will struggle to achieve its target. A total of 14,175 approvals were issued in May.

Buying a property is challenging for first home buyers who are single – but it's certainly not impossible. One option would be to use the Home Guarantee Scheme (see previous story), You could achieve the same goal by asking your parents to guarantee your home loan: they could use a portion of their home equity to guarantee some or all of the deposit, potentially allowing you to contribute as little as 5% or 0% to the deposit.

The size of the average home loan climbed to a record $626,055 at the end of May, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. That was 7.1% higher than the year before.