Australia is entering a new low-interest-rate environment and smart borrowers should seize the opportunity to sift through the competitive loans on offer.

The Reserve Bank's decision in December to cut the cash rate by 25 basis points for the second month in a row is positive news for buyers and borrowers.

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After two years of abstinence, home-buyers have been seen taking a sip from the debt bottle. Just a little one. First home buyers accounted for 20 per cent of total housing finance commitments taken out in November last year, data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Monday showed.

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AUSTRALIA'S banks could be facing a massive new class action over allegations that their mortgage lending practices have put thousands of families in severe financial stress or at risk of losing their homes.

Organisers estimate that up to 300,000 mortgage holders would be eligible to participate in the action, which is expected to focus on first home buyers and lower-income households who received loans since the onset of the global financial crisis.

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Premier Ted Baillieu must explain his role in the dispute at Phillip Island involving his planning minister Matthew Guy, the opposition says.

Mr Guy is being sued over claims he failed to follow proper planning processes and succumbed to backroom pressure from Liberal heavyweights when he backflipped over a contentious rezoning of Phillip Island farmland last year.

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It's certainly not what you should be paying. So yesterday all four of the big banks finally passed on the quarter of a per cent Reserve Bank rate cut. Big deal - or not such a big deal, as the case may be.

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Homeowners have received a bout of good news at year's end, with a private survey showing the first rise in capital city home values in eleven months.

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A SMALL pocket of 1950s real estate on a sharp bend of the Maribyrnong River is the state's most tightly held suburb.

Home owners in Essendon West stay in the ubiquitous weatherboard Californian bungalows that line the suburb's leafy streets on average nearly 19 years, according to property research group RP Data.

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A NEW suburban frontier is set to engulf once-sleepy holiday towns on the Bellarine coast.

In rezoned farm paddocks on the road to Torquay, a transformation is under way that began late in 2008 when the first section of Geelong's ring road was unveiled.

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HEAVY rainfall after a decade of drought is thought to have caused cracking in the walls of hundreds of new homes in Melbourne's west, sparking calls for an overhaul of building standards from within the housing industry.

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DESPITE one of the worst property slumps in two decades, many first-home buyers are finding it harder than ever to enter the market, with research showing they need at least $100,000 after tax to buy in half of Melbourne's suburbs.

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