The middle-class Austrian man who claims he murdered his entire family with an axe to save them from financial ruin has told officers he “loved" his victims, but that Tuesday seemed like "a good time" to kill them.

Austrian police said today that Reinhard Steinbauer, 39, did not show any signs of remorse as he told investigators how he bought the axe in a DIY store last Saturday after planning the killings for weeks.

He then celebrated the Pentecost holiday with the family on Monday, and hacked them to death on Tuesday, because the day seemed “a good time” for the murder.

Police say Mr Steinbauer, a freelance PR consultant, has given officers the full account of how he murdered his wife, aged 42, and their seven-year-old daughter with an axe in their home in Vienna’s upmarket 13th District, and later massacred his parents and his father-in-law using the same murder weapon.

According to officers, he delivered a full confession but claimed he “loved his family very much” and wanted to save them from financial ruin after he lost over €300,000 – including his entire savings and money borrowed from the family – on failed investments.

He admitted that the had been planning the murders of his wife Barbara, 42, their daughter Natalie, 7, his parents Engelbert 72 and Gabriela, 70, and father-in-law Heinrich Reiter, 80, for weeks before he finally made the decision on May 9.

Mr Steinbauer then chose Tuesday as a “good time” for the murders; after killing his wife and daughter in their home, he called the employers of his wife, who was a high-ranking civil servant in the Finance Ministry, explained that she was ill and could not come to work.

Michael Braunsperger, spokesman for Vienna Police, said: “The suspect shows no signs of remorse; he answers all questions calmly and in detail and it is not yet clear what mental state he was during the time of the crime. He claims to have tried to commit suicide.”

Dr Reinhard Haller, one of Austria’s most prominent forensic psychiatrists, has been summoned to prepare a psychological profile of Mr Steinbauer and determine whether he was responsible for his actions.

The massacre has shocked a country which is still attempting to come to terms with the case of Josef Fritzl who kept his daughter, Elisabeth, in a dungeon beneath his house for 24 years and forced her to bear him seven children

Like Mr Fritzl, Mr Steinbauer was apparently an affluent and respected member of society.

After the killings, Mr Steinbauer drove around aimlessly for several hours and unsuccessfully tried to hang himself before handing himself into police in the early hours of Wednesday morning saying: “The bodies of my dead wife and children are lying in my flat.”

Police found the body of Mrs Steinbauer in the bathroom and Natalie’s in a walk-in closet. Their remains were partially covered in sheets. The axe used in the killings was discovered in a rucksack behind the back seat of his rental car.

Letters in which Mr Stainbauer apologised for his actions have been found next to the bodies of his parents and father-in-law but none has been discovered by his wife and daughter.

The case is not expected to go on trial before autumn.

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