Should we discourage people from owning more than one house, to help ease the regional housing crisis? Galah asked two policy experts with different points of view.
Words David Hayward
PROPERTY is a national obsession. Not everyone is addicted, of course. But for those who are older and richer, it’s the biggest game in town.
Why have one house when you can have two, three, four or more? What’s wrong with that? If you work hard, why not have a holiday home or two? Why not have rental properties as well? Surely that’s a fitting return for a life of hard work and private initiative. What could possibly be wrong?
A lot, actually. The national property obsession is fuelled by monumental government subsidies. In 2020–2021, landlords claimed an eye-popping $51 billion of tax deductions. They reduced their tax by $24.4 billion. About half was for interest on loans.
On top of that, low-income tenants received $5.3 billion in rent assistance, which pretty much went straight out of their pockets and into their landlords’ instead.
