New Australian Finance Industry Association data shows non-bank lenders wrote more than 16,000 residential loans to self-managed super funds in the 12 months to June. That is more than four times the 4000 SMSF home loans the federal Labor government cited last month when arguing for a ban on residential borrowing by super funds.
AFIA said the 16,000 loans came from just 13 lender members out of a wider 150-member base, indicating the government’s numbers left out a large slice of the non-bank market. The association argues that such a large discrepancy means the impact of Labor’s proposed borrowing ban is widely misjudged, especially for funding new housing projects.
AFIA stresses that SMSF residential lending is a meaningful stream of capital, not a niche product at the fringes of the market. The group’s leadership says policymakers have designed a major intervention using partial data from only part of the lending universe.
The official figures underestimate SMSF borrowing to this extent. The ban is set to reshape a more substantial corner of residential finance than the government acknowledged.
Industry groups are pushing for a fuller picture of SMSF lending before any final decision. Labor is under pressure to revisit the data underpinning the policy.
