Property investment is ingrained in the Australian psyche, but is it too easy to cast landlords as the villain in our housing crisis?

  • shads@lemy.lol
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    1 day ago

    Thousands of words of waffle to try to be apologists for those poor unfairly maligned property investors who were just doing their best when they took advantage of circumstances and taxation benefits to snap up the available supply of a limited resource.

    Do they realise that enabling this class of people to do these things without the threat of social consequence is at least in part how this gets normalised.

    Not only that but it skews society. My sister owns two properties thanks to an interstate move for work requiring her to spend more than a decade away from the first home unit she purchased. That first unit was on the rental market for a little under a year while my Mum saw out the lease at her rental she then moved into my sisters and is maintaining the unit as though it was her own. She pays the mortgage, pays for maintenance, rates etc. My sister calls the aggregate of these payments rent (I imagine she derives some tax benefits from this but I don’t imagine it’s super significant and she does pay for things like strata fees herself). Every time she talks to her bank she gets harassed about not deriving enough income from this property asset and that she won’t be eligible for more money until she raises the “rent” my mother pays… By a lot. She is currently looking to sell the 2nd house she bought to put the money towards the next interstate purchase for the new requirements of her job and is being told the bank won’t extend her a loan until the rent on the unit is increased to a “reasonable” amount.

    Our system is broken, badly, and the only corrections I can see that would reintroduce equity will destroy the people who have invested into the property ponzi scheme. Find me a government who would bankrupt a large portion of the population, including themselves, for a better future. I’ll arrange an airborne porcine squadron to replace the Roulettes for the next ANZAC day to celebrate.

    • Taleya@aussie.zone
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      1 day ago

      Sounds like it’s time to refinance with another bank. If she’s servicing the loan, they can go fuck themselves

      • shads@lemy.lol
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        1 day ago

        I don’t know all the ins and outs of her financial situation. But I do know it’s been a point of contention. And she is not the first property owner I have talked to who has been pinged for not charging enough rent as far as a bank was concerned.

        • Taleya@aussie.zone
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          23 hours ago

          Oh i’m not doubting the situation, banks are predatory af. A higher rent is higher value is more power on their books.

          They can still go get fucked.