The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reported established house prices for the weighted average of the eight capital cities rose just 0.3 per cent in the year to the September quarter 2012.
Annually, house fell in Melbourne (down 2.3 per cent), Hobart (down 2.2 per cent) and Adelaide (down 1.1 per cent). They rose modestly in Sydney (up 1.3 per cent), Canberra (up 0.4 per cent) and Brisbane (up 0.3 per cent) while house prices bucked the national trend in Darwin (jumping 8.2 per cent) and Perth (up 4.4 per cent).
A recent report found Australia holds much of its wealth in housing assets. The Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report recently ranked Australia's average wealth per adult at $US336,000, the second highest in the world after Switzerland at $450,600 and ahead of Norway at $316,400.
Real assets such as property are a dominant form of wealth held in Australia, the report said. Average Australian real assets were $276,000 in 2012, or 64 per cent of total household assets. The level of real assets per adult in Australia is the second highest in the world after Norway, partly reflecting high house prices, the report said.
"Switzerland, Australia and Norway will likely remain at the top of the wealth-per-adult table. In terms of wealth per adult, by 2017 the US should rise to fourth place displacing Japan, which will be downgraded to seventh place," the report forecast.
Meanwhile, total global household wealth is expected to rise by almost 50 per cent in the next five years from to $318 trillion in 2017 from $215 trillion in 2012, the report predicted.
Assuming moderate and stable economic growth, China is expected to surpass Japan as the second-wealthiest country in the world behind the US. Growth in the middle-class segment is expected to be led by China and India. Of the 1.5 billion adults whose wealth is estimated to fall between $US10,000 and $US100,000 dollars in 2017, 44 per cent will reside in China, up from 36 per cent in 2012.
However, if global economic growth remains subdued in coming years, Credit Suisse has estimated that the headline forecast of global household wealth could be some $39 trillion lower.
