A desperate Scott Morrison has ignored his own advice of a week ago and launched an interventionist housing subsidy policy that will push house prices up — if it works at all.
The first-home owner grant recklessly shifts wealth towards home owners and investors, doing nothing to improve affordability. It needs to be addressed.
Despite the low success rate, governments continue to offer small sums of money to first-time buyers and wonder why it never works. Property guru Terry Ryder of Property Observer explains.
Regardless of the accuracy of the Demographia report, Australia's housing market is definitely unaffordable for those trying to get into it. Analyst Catherine Cashmore explains why.
It has taken a few days for the immediate impact of the NSW budget housing initiatives to sink in, writes Jonathan Chancellor of Property Observer.
Governments have a habit of meddling with things. This is largely due to the political imperative of being seen to be doing something to fix economic problems.
Kevin Rudd is learning a difficult lesson, not only politics, but in popularity. That is: if you try too hard to be liked, you almost certainly won’t be.
Those who thought that the gradual reduction in the first home-owner’s grant in September would cool the first home-buyer market have, for the time being, been proved mistaken.
Why are seemingly rational people paying so much more for property than they did even as recently at 10 years ago? They fall for the "property lie": the myth that property "never falls in value" and will be "more expensive next year".
If you were to believe world stock markets, the recession is drawing to a close, with the wisdom of government spending and global monetary easing spurring the world to another economic recovery. But the markets have long proven to be an unfaithful talisman.
