A real-estate lobby group has just blocked me from commenting and deleted my posts on Facebook. Apparently, they didn't like the fact that my comments on negative gearing were getting so many "likes", and that they didn't like that they were coming from a landlord.
Because the reality is the real-estate lobby is lying through their teeth and squealing like stuck pigs. I am quite happy to argue against my own interests and even *lose* money if it means that more people have a less expensive roof over the heads.
Australia's negative gearing system is absolutely terrible.
When Liberal MP John Alexander led an inquiry into affordability, and told Four Corners negative gearing has led to a housing market "dominated by speculative investors".
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-02/negative-gearing-driving-house-pri...
(I bet he was told to shut up.)
Property "investors" have been driving out first-home buyers because our system is designed around buying more property rather than building new property.
https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2015/07/scott-morrison-repeats-negative...
The Grattan Institute's research concurs that the current system has not improved housing supply and needs to be reformed.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-25/research-calls-for-abolishing-inco...
So does Monash University's Centre for Population and Urban Research.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-07/negative-gearing-causing-housing-...
Even The Economist - hardly a hot-bed of firebrand radicals - describes the Australian system as "crazy".
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The crazy practice of "negative gearing", which allows investors in property to write nearly everything off against tax, has also helped push up prices beyond the reach of Australians in their 20s and 30s (many of whom, even if they are able to buy a property, still have to live with their parents to afford it)
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http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21698298-prime-minister-gambles-weeks...
The Coalition has claimed, curiously, that Labor's policy of grand-fathering existing negative gearing arrangements and restricting new claims to *new* buildings only will lead to a fall in house prices *and* an increase in rents, which is ludicrous.
The Treasury has held to tell the Coalition to stop lying about a supposed dramatic fall in housing prices - multiple times now.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/jan/08/labor-says-treasu...
https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/treasury-tells-liberals-stop-lying-lab...
As for rents increasing, this is a zombie claim that needs to die. Fact check provided, well, facts, years ago, the reality of the situation.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-06/hockey-negative-gearing/6431100
For their part, real estate agents have described existing negative gearing in the following terms:
"Simply put: the tax man [read: working tax payers] and the rental income pays for your investment property."
https://web.archive.org/web/20160402180937/http:
//www.remaxsuccess.com.au/investing/negative-gearing/
(As always, feel free to share this)