What is the solution to housing affordability? | 7.30 

I honestly can't be bothered anymore. The juice isn't worth the squeeze. Thinking of taking my money and retiring overseas. I saved up for 15 years, lived frugally, didn't go on holidays, took up extra work, arguably wasted my youth only to have house prices continually increase and not be obtainable.

I tell you what, as someone who works in the insurance industry, the amount of people I come into contact with that own 5-10 properties both interstate and within their current state is baffling. There needs to be a limit to the amount of investment properties a person/family can own. You can release as much land from local governments as you want, but what good will that do when it's the same investors picking up the houses that come up for sale because they can outbid and over pay to no end compared to those in the lower-middle class. The greed of people already well off is the problem. Pure, unadulterated greed. Any increase to their expenditure is recouped by unregulated increases to the rent they'll charge their tenants, and in the current state of housing, you either pay what you're told in rent, or go homeless. My rent has gone up $100 a week after being in the same property for 2 years, every payment made on time, the same time every week, perfect inspections, and yet not one iota of this money has been put towards any kind of improvements to the property. We went 6 months without any heating due to the air conditioning unit breaking and it took a threat of a complaint to the ombudsman before action was taken. The way this country is going, I swear we will start to see millennial suicide rates increasing because at this point, what is the point when every step forward, the greedy push you 10 steps back.

Step one, Ban air bnb. People buying houses to rent out on the weekends is hurting communities.

My parents are utterly convinced that I could buy a house tomorrow, and I rent an apartment just to spite them. Of course, they bought their house in 1986 for $70,000, so clearly I can too, because nothing has changed in 36 years...

It's easy to solve this. Finish up negative gearing immediately and watch all the investors who are hording 2, 5, 10 or so properties put them on the market. Prices will tumble. Finally our young people will be able to afford a home!

It’s easy to fix but it’s against the interest of property investors, and that includes many of the politicians

I'd say the biggest issue is the changed mindset of housing from being a necessity to an investment. This has probably been enabled through gung-ho policies and tax breaks (Capital Gains tax and Negative Gearing). Removing those tax breaks for properties that are not your main residence will go a long way. Also stronger rental rights should be probably be a consideration.

It’s an absolutely awful idea to let them buy their house with super. The point of super is to take pressure off the next generation to support people when they’re too old to work. Our population IS going to start DECREASING when this generation retires. These kinds of policies are guaranteeing that Australia will decline and be pushed into a corner when that time comes. Completely shortsighted.

1. Abolish negative gearing 2. Rezone to allow more infill development and mixed zoning 3. Treat housing as a necessity not as an investment 4. wait until prices drop

I do own a home and if my home went down in value it wouldn't really matter. I need a place to live. If I need to upgrade then if all property is falling at about the same % then I'll still have the same purchasing power.

This is total bullcrap. The problem with US / AU /CA housing is UNIT SIZE. I live in EU. When I was at a start of my career I lived in a 40 sqm apartment which I bought. As our paychecks grew we sold the 40 sqm and moved to a 3 BR 90 sqm apartment. I see ppl here at entry level jobs living in what looks like 200+ sqm single family housing units. Thats just ridiculous. I have a friend in USA who several years ago cried to me about how they paid massive amount of money for their 6 BR 300 sqm house in suburban Virginia. There is 2 of them and they arent planning children. When I asked "what the hell are you using extra 4 bedrooms for" - they said they have a cinema room, xbox room, ps room and a snooker room. Crazy.

American here. It would be positively disastrous if the federal government gave people early access to their social security. I hope Australians know better than to abuse what could be their only source of funds in their old age.

It's almost like the market is incapable of self-management and neoliberal theory is absolutely worthless if you want a functioning economy that serves the citizens rather than a few big investors.

Australia's relationship with housing has changed.... Yeah it's an investment not the thing that keeps rain off your head at night. Completely broken understanding

You also need to make sure that those who buy a house live in Australia and there enough houses that are affordable for renters

You shouldn't be able to own like 5 houses all negative geared as rentals and if you have to get them on a mortgage then it's not yours and you shouldn't be able to rely on renters for your "income" There's way to much reliance on property as income

Stop AirBnB.

We can start with by not taking advice from rich news editors.

I am 50. I have a $60,000 deposit that I was going to use to buy my first home right before covid. Then covid hit and despite an initial slight decline in prices, that quickly changed and prices have continued to boom. The government keeps artificially inflating the market and I have been completely priced out. Ironically, I have now had to move out of my previous home (due to ill health of the owner) and I am currently, technically homeless. I am blessed to have friends and family who have let me housesit etc, but I don’t know how long that will last. I’ve been applying for rentals since August last year and haven’t been able to secure a property. I can tell you I have no idea what the future holds for me, and I’m scared!

Labor needs to acknowledge that those people who want to keep negative gearing by and large don't vote Labor anyway.

Negative Gearing should be abolished regardless of what the opponents think. They look out for themselves, not the country.

8:35 I can think of quite a few people who would love and need to see housing prices drop, such as the current generation of first time home owners and all the people younger than them who, by the looks of it, will end up in an even less affordable housing market. It baffles me that capitalism has gotten to this stage where the basic necessity for shelter is being locked away from people basically because of their date of birth. There was over 1 million unoccupied dwellings in 2016, there is more than enough to go around for everyone to have fair chance at owning home. We don't need to rip down trees, churn up the earth and more suffocating urban sprawl.

12:00 "people might become life-long renters" Mate, current renters will be left homeless if those who currently own houses are going to start renting instead. I don't care if Karen can't own her home. I care that I and everyone I know is on the brink of homelessness because of the rental crisis.

The issue is we have turned property into an investment vehicle... and whilst equity and capital gains are fantastic. Being able to offset losses against your income and being able to leverage your equity to buy more and more property is why we are screwed.

Stop mass migration, foreign ownership, and limit negative gearing to one to two properties max.

Stop people from owning multiple properties (find a reasonable number) and put limits on Airbnb rentals. The amount of houses that are empty for long periods is ridiculous when you see the amount of people desperate for long term housing.

“Average” rent prices are ridiculous! Stop buying expensive houses and renting them way to high ffs! Investors stop buying the cheaper houses! Unless you can rent them out for reasonable amounts! Who’s regulating reasonable rents? Being stuck in a rent trap is not ok! Why bother working anymore? Is that why the unemployment rate is so low people have given up? Clearly immigration plays a part and I guess rich people/investors/influencers don’t need a job anymore. Are people still sending their kids to private schools? Why? To help them into high paying jobs? Laughable! What high paying job can support them if they choose to have a family.. I hope there are some smart people out there figuring out a solution for this and they’re not just getting into housing development and using gov grants to build housing for everyone that’ll need social housing in the future…

you nailed it with the investors..bat sh1t .crazy that we give tax breaks for multiple homes

Not rocket science. It’s touted as more complicated than it really is. Allow the cost (interest rates) and availability (how careful banks are about lending) of debt to normalise to normal historical levels. Remove investor tax breaks. Close loopholes for foreign purchases of real estate (money laundering etc. as well). Real estate would implode. The problem is that it’s a one way street. Once you allow the above factors to get out of hand over a long period of time, the entire economic and social edifice mutates around it. Now, if we allow it to correct, the entire economy blows up like Ireland/Iceland. Either way it’s unsustainable and there will be blood even if nothing changes. The question simply is how it will break things, will it be sooner or later, and who’ll suffer the most. It’s a true marvel to watch politicians and elites twist the discussion to avoid acknowledging the obvious to people.

Good on Jason Claire for doing the interview and answering the questions. I can't remember the last time I heard a politician actually answer usefully lol

That bloke that said no one wants there home price to go down .... I DO.... People are so blind . If my son cannot afford to buy a home I have failed as a parent. Homes are your space in this world that is only yours . Every tax incentive for investors needs to be removed . All stimulation of new homes needs to be removed. All overseas ownership gone Then I can guarantee "poof automatically affordable housing "zero cost to the tax payer . Actually "poof more income for the government from property's" The only reason why this does not happen is the rich looking after the rich. Ohh yes I do have a home and investment properties. So I am not a poor lazy person. I am Australian and want to see home ownership more important than anything

NEED TO PUT A HOLD ON IMMIGRATION FOR A FEW YEARS!! HOW CAN WE HOUSE IMMIGRANTS AND REFUGEES IF WE CANT HOUSE OUR OWN PEOPLE WHO WERE BORN HERE??

Instead of using INTEREST RATES to control house prices why don't we just CONTROL the number of properties than can be SOLD for INVESTMENT PURPOSES. Meaning when average house prices rise above say 1 percent per year above wages growth, then reduce the number of properties that can be SOLD TO INVESTORS only. and increase the qty to owner occupiers.

Cure greed!

When you have more people looking for homes, than you have homes available, the price will always be high.

If ever you wanted evidence of corruption - take a good look at that graph that compares global house prices to Australia house prices.

The answer to this is simple. APPLY DIMINISHING RETURNS TO INVESTMENT PROPERTY. As investors own more and more properties, tax them MORE. Diminishing returns applies to basically everything, but after 20 years of a majority LNP federal gov, there's no wonder why we are where we are right now. The way this country works is that once you get one property, getting the second, then the third, then the fourth becomes much easier. It's completely backwards.

The idea that we need to release more lands needs to be held up to scrutiny. It's an easy option, but it is not the only option available to increase supply. The cost of running out infrastructure to these places adds up, and they are often underserved when it comes to public transport and other public services because of this. It's also extremely environmentally detrimental. We need more green spaces if where going to get to net zero, releasing more land for development is counterproductive to that goal. Furthermore, LGA's do tend to release land for development anyway, as the alternative is to increase density with infill and the removal of single family homes - which faces fierce opposition from residential groups which label it as 'over development'. That's the exact opposite of nimbyism. In Victoria, local governments releasing land and opposition to high density housing has actually be quite a problem for the state government. It's planning strategy, which relied on an urban growth boundary and higher density development has been undermined. As a result, progress on tackling the states affordable housing crisis has stalled. The importance of urban growth boundaries and higher density development can be gathered from evidence from many Suburban cities in the US. Fierce opposition to high density developed resulted in cities just swelling in size. Over decades this has resulted in many cities going bankrupt because of the astronomical cost of maintaining this infrastructure and providing services. The value of homes plummeted, businesses shut, and people lost their livelihoods. Many people in those situations were still paying off mortgages when this happened, and as was predicted in this video, they ended up with an enormous amount of debt paying for a house that was now near worthless. Releasing more land to fix the housing crisis will only lead to a crises is household debt. Thus any solution to fix the housing affordability crises must include urban growth boundaries, infill, and high density development. The construction of social housing can be a part of this. But as we've seen its just not being adopted because it's politically unpopular. In my opinion, LGAs should have less planning power, or state governments should be able to overrule their decisions to effectively implement their strategies. If this were to happen, house prices could continue to grow, cities won't bankrupt themselves, the environment and climate will be better off. And we built more social housing, and we stop given tax breaks to investors, all Australians will be able to able to access the market and affordable a safe and stable place to live. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk

Make a 5 year cap on property sales for those who already have and live in their own home. Investors are just taking up any advantages offered by banks and accumulating more and more of the pie and the people who can't get into the market, even though they have the deposits are going homeless. We need to curb this greedy behaviour of the very wealthy, the workers who need homes will be forced out of all liveable areas. Who will do all the work if there is no middle class living there? Stop offering incentives only for 1st time home owners or by putting stipulations that it must be a new built home. It is such a narrow scheme. There needs more equality in the offerings. Help anyone who doesn't own their own home. I have never owned my own home but because I have a partner who did own one with his ex-wife in the 80's (which she of course, took when leaving) I am automatically denied a 1st time home owners grant, as his spouse. Even if the house is 100% in my name. It is penalising people for remarrying people who are on the down and out or people who want an older property. Ridiculous!

The solution is so remarkably simple. Put an end to money laundering through Australian real estate, put an end to foreign ownership, like I don't know, like other countries do. Put an end to negative gearing, stop throwing every last bit of political energy towards inflating house prices. The solution is as simple as that.

There needs to be laws around how many properties owners are allowed to rent. Restrict it to a second property only. There are people with 3 and 4 homes as it's easier to get a fifth than it is the first.

We should make housing illegal to be turned into investments. You can only buy a house if you plan on living in it. That'll get rid of the prices being jacked up. Which FOREIGN investors are guilty of doing. They just come in, buy a ton of houses, jack the prices up, and they don't even need the houses. They are just using them to make more money. And by doing so making it impossible to get a house unless you are rich. Housing is a human right, not a investment.

The latest Aussie Census shows there is more than 1million homes unoccupied - the question is WHY? Are these investors getting too much of a tax break with these properties that they happily hold on to them even at a loss. Political parties need to look into this.

I’m not an expert by any means - but a huge issue that I have witnessed is WHO is buying the properties. There are land releases happening here in Queensland where investors or ONE couple are buying MULTIPLE properties in land/house releases. I personally know of one neighbourhood South side of Brisbane where a single couple purchased FOUR houses/blocks of land in a single release. So there were ALLOT of people who had FINALLY saved up enough for a deposit and MISSED OUT on a house. And now the prices have sky rocketed back up, leaving those people that missed out without homes… Obviously it’s a much bigger issue than this. But it’s crazy how many contributing factors make it so hard for people.

Labor at least attempted to instigate policy’s to destabilise this insanity at the last election and the people spoke, and the madness continues.

The super scheme is just something that looks good, but doesn't do much. How many first home buyers has $125k in super?! So the actual impact will be way lower. And then they're screwed if they ever want to move.

The govt should not solve the wrong problem by making it easy for people to enter the housing market. Govt should rather look towards making housing as an unattractive business/ investment option. One way of doing this is by giving tax cuts to people who are paying EMI for their frist home, and taxing more to people who has 2 or more properties. Another way is for councils to tax more if the owner is not dwelling in the house.

How to fix housing affordability. 1 Owning property is a right that only citizens and PRs being here and working for over 5 years should have. 2. Super can be used for purchasing/deposit of a house. 3 Foriegn owned assets should be bought by the government for at market valuation and resold in accordance to 1. 4. Individiuals, sole traders and pty/ ltds only can have residential land assets. Restrict ptd ltd to 4 holdings or $10 million total, which ever is greater. The fact australias housing market can be used in foriegn money laundering schemes/ corporate cashcow is disgraceful. These ideas will tank the market BUT makes ownership possible again, who knows my generation might actually get to start a family.

Back when our parents and grandparents bought houses, repayments couldn't be higher than 30% of the total income. And they needed a good deposit to go with it. They also didn't get into debt for anything and everything. Paid cash for cars, no credit cards and income could be guaranteed for an employees lifetime. They bought what they could afford and the houses were basic, usually 2-3 brm, 1 bath, one lounge, dining room, kitchen and laundry. And kids shared bedrooms. One TV if you could afford one. Often Mum made our clothes or we had to wear hand me downs, no such things as kids expecting designer labels. Life was different and the great Aussie (British, American) dream was something you worked hard for.

Start from the end user’s perspective. 1) People who want a home 2) investors. Owner/occupiers would be more likely to buy into a community style development where the value of the home is restricted/controlled. This is a good solution for lifestyle/security etc. Investors are using the property market to create wealth at the expense of low income families and they will always be dominant. There needs to be a revolution in Australia. Different social needs need different solutions and the government needs to be more creative.

Fighting 7.9% inflation (more like 15%) with a 1% fed funds interest rate is like stopping a forest fire with a bucket of water. Folks prepare accordingly. Make investment in other not to depend on the government for funds.

Without watching: bet we don’t mention zoning laws…… free standing family homes = sprawl = shortage

If companies couldn't buy established dwellings that would be a start. And in japan foreigners cant buy a home. Building more houses might also help

The Elephant in the room - Money printing has cause this latest wave of equity market and property market to skyrocket these polies and journos will never admit. Negative gearing is facilitated by this alone. The Cantillien affect

Make it financially unattractive to amass multiple properties to stop people from treating them like highly speculative financial securities.

It should be illegal for people to own more then 3 homes

Try asking a builder to construct a three bedroom one bathroom house no family room no alfresco area no theatre room or parents retreat or built in robes. No building company would do it and no council would approve it he sent the high price of building

restrict negative gearing to only new homes. I think it would decrease the competition on established homes while at the same time encouraging investors to build new homes.

Why is it that an Australian cannot buy a house in China As the government doesn't allow you yet Chinese can come here and buy up all the property? why is that?

Imagine touching negative gearing to turn home ownership away from being an investment for the very rich an into a right for everyone...oh wait Labor did that last election an the media crucified them an they had to wind it back.

Tax landlords out of the market or local councils step in with price controls. Price rigging of property prices fuelled huge profits for banks & investors. Now Corporate landlords buying huge swaths of properties to take ownership out of reach of most people in short keep you poor. Homes are for families NOT investors that’s the issue.

Negative gearing is the problem. I can't afford to buy land in my area on a single salary, I live in country nsw and atleast half the houses in the small town I live in only have people in the during the 3 warmer school holidays.

The solution is to stop Chinese buying Australian property and stamp duty

This makes me so angry. Australia is no longer about "a fair go", it's about who gets in front of who, everywhere. Even in crisis housing they make it difficult to live with people in the hope others will move out and they get the place to themselves. SELFISHNESS AND GREED is the new AUSTRALIA.

Printing money is bad because of inflation, but printing debt which has lead to high house prices isn’t inflation (for some reason). We’ve undervalued wages and productive work and overvalued assets and investment. Labor tried to run on making society more fair last election and they lost. Australian is sadly a majority selfish society at this point.

With so many people, families in the world and an absolute amount of land...it would seem there'd be a limit on how many homes you might be allowed to own. Most low cost homes are all snatched up for rental properties by people who already have homes and rentals. So they're essentially locking up the market with their own personal gains.

Gov should build heaps of quality higher density housing in areas with good public transport and sell to first home buyers at reasonable prices provided they live there for x amount of time.

We have seen what developers do when Governments open up land. You only need look at Victoria and their one way suburban gridlocks to recognise that as soon as land opens up, the developers jump in and throw as many houses down with little to no access to any amenities or public transport... Even here in QLD where you have people moving into outer Logan. No trains near Greenbank means its a 2.5hr one way trip into the city unless you are a trady who works out that way. The people of Australia have already decided over the past 10 years, on how they wanted this to go and now we are seeing the results of the choices that have been made. No politician will do anything about this, not only because they cannot due to be unpopular, but simply because they do not want to...how many of them do you think own investment property after all?

Its not nimbyism by councils. This ignores the reality that councils have been stripped of influence. Greens plan is best way to increase housing without pushing up housing prices.

House prices aren’t going up. Fiat currencies are being devalued via money printing. Home loans is the main mechanism of money creation in debt-based economies 🙃

Land was in 2002 inelbourne north $34,000 for a block ,now is $326,000,+ house goes to $1,200.000 ,+ council rates+bank rates,

Its not the gov schemes that are the problem , its the outright blatant greed of us all. This is the problem with unrestrained free market capitalism. No im not suggesting socialism or communism. But even capitalism still needs some restraints. Regulate the number of investment properties and regulates rental and housing prices.

The politician said it. They don't want to make housing more affordable because it is unpopular with home owners who have probably already seen their property values double or triple. This is the case for both ALP and LNP at this election. If this is the case, both major parties should come to a gentlemen's agreement and promise that no party will introduce policy to prop up the market. Don't give selfish voters a choice to prioritise themselves over the good of the nation. Let the free market punish the people who have over extended themselves. Otherwise we'll be dealing with AVG 5 million homes in Australia and kids who won't be signing up for 20 yr mortgages but mortgages till death.

Change negative gearing. Force homes that are not in use beck on the market.

I’m a home owner. My partner and I have agreed that if house prices were to depreciate that would be a good thing. It wouldn’t hugely impact us because our house isn’t an investment - it’s a home. We aren’t looking to sell it to make money, it’s not an investment for us. Depreciation of house prices will more likely impact those who have multiple properties and honestly, that’s part of the problem.

What do Renters get? NOTHING!

We are one of the most urbanised countries in the world, with cities dominated by land hungry single storey suburban slums. To me the answer is to promote regional development, along with increasing housing density (apartments) with excellent amenities around city centres.

Cancel negative gearing. Make foreign investment illegal. Make multiple investment property illegal.

Paying my house off at a young age changed my life and gave me so much freedom. I wish everyone else could do the same. 🏠

40% - 80% taxes in Australia the problem you can't save for a home

The solution it to lower the price, not give handouts that increase the price. Tax capital gains like they do in the USA! Capital gains isn't free money, it's literally just transferring wealth of future earnings of younger generations via cutting interest rates so they can borrow more.. Enforce debt to income ratios / reduce the supply of credit that fuels house prices. Limit negative gearing to 1 investment property per investor. Use the extra tax revenue from capital gains and reduced negative gearing incentives to cut income tax of the workers who actually contribute and pay taxes , as opposed to the free ride asset owners have had for the last 40 years

Greed has grown out control just like here in America.

There are still bargains in the regional areas in WA. Geraldton is a good spot to buy now before the boom. The town has a great 10 year plan and prices are still under 300K.

Limit negative gearing to one property, stop international buyers and seize or force illegally purchased homes to sell.

Stop foreign ownership.

Ban foreign investors from buying residential property

Order a ( Cap ) on Housing prices!

The simple question is this - to get the housing more affordable means that those who bought at the top with the huge mortgages will face reduced housing values, and, perhaps, negative equity and loan calls. No major party is actually going to do that. Also, the major cost drivers of housing are taxes. For instance, on settlement of a new home the developer pays GST (1/11 of the house price) + the buyer pays the Stamp Duty (4-5%), so 15% tax on settlement of a new dwelling. Now, the developer would pay Section 94 contribution to local Council (about $10-$20K), State Government contributions for certain areas, land tax and all other charges. In totality, the average home price in Australia includes 30-40% of taxes.

Land isn't the issue, it's the type of houses. In Europe smaller multistory homes or apartments are everywhere. On top of that houses shouldn't be an investment, multi-home ownership should be discouraged with some form of tax rather than a negative gearing offset.

I hate this world.

It’s interest rates. They’re too low.

Under LNP there will be no superannuation left.

It's all too late now housing has become the best investment property. Put triple tax on housing property and no tax on other investments.

Last election labour lost because of a pledge to reduce negative gearing. The choice was between the government managing the housing market or letting the market decide. Guess what, we went with the market - markets crash, bubbles burst and hard landing s are real. You reap what you sow.

9:13 that's always been the case, it's just that those who *had* that privilege are starting to lose it and they don't like the reality the rest of us already live with.

Is encouraging investment in housing even good for economy growth?! It certainly isnt good for alot of everyday Australians trying to get into their own homes. What a rort.

So true more social housing and higher density. Like HDB apartments in Singapore.

My dad is a single parent and didn't own a house, so I guess I'm doomed. Awesome.

And what about renters? Those of us on benefits can NEVER afford to buy, and then this government even cancels the NRAS, so I guess it's ok to let low income renters be priced out of the market and end up living in thier car. This country is stuffed.

the issue is and always has been the tax offsets given to home owners. my wife and i struggle for every cent and never get close to owning a house with 2 jobs. my boss earns tonnes has 3 houses and gets to claim so much loss on them he got a tax return from centrelink enough to put a deposit on a 4th.