The demand for home loans was flat in January against expectations of a lift, as the value of home loans provided to investors fell, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The data showed the number of home loans granted in January held steady at a seasonally adjusted 51,054.
Bloomberg analysts expected the number of housing finance commitments to lift by 0.5 per cent in the month.
However, total housing finance by value fell by 0.4 per cent in January, seasonally adjusted, to $26.86 billion.
The value of loans for investment housing fell by 3.3 per cent in the month to $10.34 billion, after rising by 40 per cent over 2013.
By comparison, housing loans to first home buyers increased by just 1.5 per cent over the year to January, after declining for most of 2013.
National Australia Bank senior economist Spiros Papadopoulos expects housing finance to bounce back in coming months.
"I wouldn't get too concerned about one month of data," he said.
"We have seen a strong upward trend over the past year and given low interest rates will be around for most of this year, we expect these series to bounce back in coming months.
"It's encouraging that we have seen small growth in the first home buyers, their ratio of owner occupier approvals has risen to 13.2 per cent from 12.7 per cent.
"That had been trending lower."
JP Morgan economist Tom Kennedy said a 5.8 per cent rise in loan approvals for the construction of new homes in January was encouraging.
"From a growth perspective that's what you want to see because you want construction activity picking up, which is what really matters for the overall GDP (gross domestic product) picture," he said.
"Construction activity will have a knock on effect for employment, not just in the construction sector -- it's broader than that, it's quite a large component of the Australian economy."
Mr Kennedy said the Reserve Bank of Australia would like to see construction activity pick up and purchases of established dwellings fall.
"That would take some heat away from house prices," he said.