Just as federal parliament and an assortment of lobbyists, urgers and well-meaning people start the big inquiry into banks and banking competition next week, we may have seen the first real stirrings of life in the non-bank lending sector since the credit crunch struck in late 2007.
At the heart of the recent kerfuffle over bank competition is the perceived lack of it with the big four dominating, especially in the politically sensitive housing finance sector.
The federal government is expected to produce its long- awaited second batch of proposals to try and encourage banking competition "within the next week" according to federal treasurer Wayne Swan yesterday in Brisbane.
The first attempt to stimulate competition back in 2008 failed, helped by the impact of the GFC which made consumers and customers more cautious as they remained or returned to the bigger, safer banks like the NAB, ANZ, Westpac and CBA.
The latest moves from Canberra could include easier account switching, action on exit fees and the like.
All are well and good, but what is needed is more home owners and would be home owners prepared to leave the big banks for non- bank sector lenders and others who survived the crisis.
Now there are definite signs that is happening, slowly, but the move has suddenly become clearer.
According to the housing finance figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, October saw the biggest rise in non-banking home lending for almost three years.
This includes loans made by building societies, credit unions and wholesalers selling through mortgage brokers.
The move was described as "encouraging" by several economists yesterday.
The ABS said yesterday:
"The number of commitments for owner occupied dwellings financed by non-banks seasonally adjusted series rose 12.2% in October 2010.
"The number of commitments for owner occupied dwellings financed by permanent building societies (trend) rose 3.9%.
"The seasonally adjusted series rose 21.4% in October 2010, the largest rise since December 2007."
In fact October was the sixth month in a row where the share of the housing finance market held by the majors has fallen, a trend that has escaped all the critics.
The sharp rise in non bank lending contrasts to the more modest 0.4% rise for the banks, according to the ABS.
But the loans were made ahead of the RBA rate rise in November.
Refinancing of existing mortgaged homes rose 2.9% in the month, a sign that some buyers saw a rate rise coming.
Another sign was a sharp rise in the number of fixed loans.
The proportion of homebuyers taking out a fixed-rate loan of two years or longer grew to 6.9% in October compared to 4.4% in September, the biggest number since July of last year.
Overall, the ABS said Australian housing finance commitments for owner-occupied housing rose 1.9% in October, seasonally adjusted, to 49,307.
That was well above the market median forecast of a 0.3% rise.
That was the strongest monthly figures since last May when there was a 2.9% rise.
The ABS said total housing finance by value rose by 2.2% in October, seasonally adjusted, to $20.901 billion.
