Furniture retailer, Nick Scali, has defied the retail slump, lifting sales for a second straight year.

The family owned company expects a buoyant housing construction market, fuelled partly by low interest rates, will continue to help sales, but held back from issuing specific earnings forecasts.

Nick Scali made a profit of $14.2 million in the year to June, up 16 per cent from the previous year, when that year’s one-off payment from the NSW government for scuttling new store plans is excluded.

Sales of $141.4 million in 2013/14 were up 11 per cent, due to two new store openings and higher sales in its existing 37 stores.

The company is on track to open its first stores in Western Australia by the third quarter of the current financial year, and plans to open three other new stores in other states.

AAP