Top brass from the Reserve Bank of Australia will have a chance to provide their views on an uptick in underlying inflation when they face Senate questioning.
The RBA's preferred inflation gauge - the trimmed mean - rose 0.1 percentage points to 2.8 per cent for January, while the more volatile headline consumer price index held steady at 2.5 per cent.
While the monthly figure released on Wednesday is prone to bounce around more and plays a lesser role in the central bank board's decision-making, a continued slowdown in housing costs augurs well for March quarter data, available on April 30.
RBA governor Michele Bullock has said the board was cautious about the prospects of further monetary easing following its first 25 rate cut in more than four years earlier in February.
"The board is committed to being guided by the incoming data and our evolving assessment of the risks," Ms Bullock said.
It's unlikely that the RBA will be convinced to cut again based off just the monthly inflation data, with the next board decision on April 1.
But the rates market is growing confident a May cut is on the cards, pricing it at a 62 per cent chance.
RBA officials will be asked about the latest inflation data when they front an estimates hearing in Canberra on Thursday.
Softer housing inflation and a re-weighting of the CPI basket to assign lesser importance to electricity prices should cause the trimmed mean for the quarter to come in 10 basis points below the RBA's forecasts, CBA senior economist Stephen Wu said.
That should pave the way for another 25 basis point cut at their May board meeting, he said.
While growth in new dwelling prices has reached its lowest point in four years, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics release, the challenge for first home buyers to crack into the housing market is still as hard as its been.
The price of an average entry-level house in Australia grew by more than 50 per cent over the past five years, Domain's First Home Buyer report revealed on Thursday.
It now takes a median first home buyer four years and 10 months to save up a 20 per cent deposit for an average entry-level house worth $617,000.
But there was some good news in certain areas, Domain chief economist Nicola Powell said.
"In Sydney, while it's still the toughest city overall, it’s now 15 months faster to save for an entry-level unit compared to five years ago," she said.
"This is thanks to higher wages, better interest rates on savings and more stable unit prices."
Melbourne is the only capital city where the time to save for both an entry-priced house and unit deposit has decreased over the past five years.
