Leave property investors alone

The esteemed Grattan Institute yesterday released its much-awaited reporting on housing policy and the need for major reform. The central recommendations focused on a re-think of investor-focused incentives like negative gearing.

Shannon Molloy

BY SHANNON MOLLOY

Whenever property markets begin to recover after an extended lull or downturn, a number of pundits reemerge to express their concern about a so-called and looming affordability crisis.

House prices are getting too high, they claim. Young people have no chance of paying a mortgage, it’s often said. There’s a bubble forming that’ll pop and swallow the world, doomsayers cry.

You look at cities like Sydney or Melbourne that experience a several per cent increase in their median house prices in the space of a year and those alarmists’ dire warnings seem pretty compelling.

I mean, you only need to flick open a newspaper on a Monday and read about weekend auction clearance rates to probably agree that things are a bit crazy at the moment.

But let’s look at the facts, contained in the Grattan Institute’s Renovating housing policy report that was released yesterday.

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Read the Grattan Institute report

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