It's hard to tell what these lunatics will come up with next. They seem determined to wreck Australia. Big Spending. Big Taxing. Big Immigration. The very worst of Socialism. And they get to do it with only 32.6% of the primary vote. What a circus this country is. Our political class is rubbish. Following the appalling totalitarianism of Covid, they are not to be trusted with anything. "They" being both Green Labor and the Coalition. Australia is rooted.

Sorry Graham, mostly disagree with your take. I believe that negative gearing should be exclusive to brand new never lived in homes and commercial investments/shares etc. With an upper limit in the residential market of 5 or 6 houses.

That's enough foregone tax from this particular area. And should force a lot of older homes onto the real estate market as real estate investors consolidate their investment portfolios. Suggest they look to energy products like MSR thorium and rare earths/lithium etc. And a few promising startups.

Why MSR thorium?

Because we are getting nuclear subs and will likely have nuclear missiles located here once the B 52 planes are stationed here. And because we need carbon free energy as much as a drowning man needs a life jacket, but only if we wish to build stuff here like nuclear submarines which consume horrendous energy in the build.

Unless we want to pay quadruple or worse as spending blowouts, we need a power source both we and the housing/manufacturing industry can afford. And if it's carbon free! So much the better along with power prices as low as 3 cents PKWH. I kid you not!
Alan B.

The housing crisis is a combination of mismanagement, an extremely poorly set out Tax system, loads of personal greed, loads of indifference to forward planning & an utter lack of sense of responsibility by too many !
Negative gearing only overcomes the above for a time before it inevitably causes a collapse of the markets & brings on inflation ! It's like a Swiss Cuckoo clock with the bird having fallen off the perch & jamming the works inside !

Sorry Graham, the cheap rent being an advantage of home ownership doesn't work for most mortgages. With current interest rates it is cheaper to rent than pay the interest on a $500,000 loan. If you then add another $200 a week cost in rates, insurance & a little maintenance it would be a very bad deal, if not for inflation.

After 10, 20 or more years of inflation the deal becomes essential for a comfortable retirement, but I know a number of young folk getting out of homes they can no longer to afford with current interest rates. Thank god we don't have Keating back with his 15%+ interest rates.

Makes property sound like a Ponzi scheme that's dependent upon, amongst other variables, Australians diving into the market when possibly neither prepared nor sensible i.e. viewing as a guaranteed wealth or value creator?

The emerging issue is now and for the next generation the baby boomer bubble/bomb will transition to retirement, downsize and pop its clogs, followed by low fertility generations and stagnation.

Many informed by media, including RE agitprop, are always reminded on (undefined) 'immigration' (more temp churn over of renters), not just for nativism, but to suggest that there is (higher) floor to future property values.

The present narratives are shortages, high rents, high immigration, but falling house prices (?); there seems to be no clear data vs. guesswork or inferences from headline numbers and/or anecdotes of related players?

However, in real terms (all costs adjusted not only CPI) property values have been treading water vs. a decade of stagnant incomes, while more voters eg. baby boomers, become retirees.

Inflation-money manipulation gone wrong !