Bank of Queensland remains wary of Brisbane apartment market

The Bank of Queensland chairman Roger Davis has indicated he remained wary about the Brisbane apartment market.

Speaking at the bank’s annual general meeting on Thursday, Davis said cooling markets on the east coast of Australia were being watched closely.

“BOQ takes some comfort from moderating east coast housing prices and risk conditions, especially in Sydney, and sees no evidence of any systemic weakness in its housing portfolio or substantive increases in its mortgage arrears,” Davis said.

“We do remain wary of conditions in the residential apartment market, especially in Brisbane, where the RBA is warning that this financial year is “crunch time” given the oversupply, low rental increases, tightening credit conditions and ongoing targeted macroprudential regulations,” Domain Media reported.

REIQ chief executive Antonia Mercorella said the bank’s warning to shareholders was fair, but said the medium to long term outlook was much more positive.

“We’ve been dealing with concerns about the oversupply for the past two years,” she said.

“There’s really no evidence at the moment there’s a great cause for alarm. From our perspective, it’s better to take a long term view of the issue."