While the majority of first-home buyers are still couples, single women are outpacing single men in terms of property purchase.
This is according to buyer data that appears to indicate women are more likely to set up a home on their own than their male counterparts, Domain reports.
Overall single first-home buyer numbers decreased year-on-year from 2015 to 2016, the Mortgage Choice statistics reveal, but the ratio of women to men is increasing in favour of the former group.
Some 27.7 per cent of first-home buyers bought places by themselves in 2015 - and 55.2 per cent of this number were women.
In 2016, the overall number of single buyers dropped slightly to 25.8 per cent - but the proportion of this figure accounted for by women grew to 60.6 per cent.
The percentage of women against the total pool of first-home buyers stood at 15.6 per cent last year, which was also a slight increase on the corresponding figure for 2015. Furthermore, the percentage of men fell by two per cent, from 12 to 10 over the same time frame.
Erin Munro, a 32-year-old journalist who recently bought her first home, is representative of these trends, telling Domain that she wanted to buy a place for herself in Melbourne.
She said she felt she had outgrown sharing houses with others and acknowledged the financial logic played a part in her decision.
"When I calculated the amount I'd spend as a single person would be pretty much the same as a mortgage, it made more sense to put that money towards something I could eventually benefit from," Ms Munro explained.
"I wanted to make a home that was really mine - my furniture, my look," she continued. "I'm a bit of an introvert, so having a space to unwind at the end of the day makes a difference."
