[xax2]

[QUOTE=leesa;5992334]Same here, I don't think it should be permitted to treat housing as an investment.

So, no one should own an investment property????? Where are all the people that want to (or have to) rent going to live?....the government is going to be able to supply house for all of them.

Since the end of the mining boom, the Australian economy, particularly on the East coast has been propped up by a construction boom, much of it townhouses & apartments. Many of these townhouses & apartments have been purchased by 'mum & dad' investors...those rotten people trying to get ahead in life...without all this building, our economy would be going backwards because we don't manufacture as much here any more. Without investors to buy much of that construction, it probably wouldn't get built.

Although none of us want to see spiralling house prices, which leads to unaffordability for the next generation, believe me, you don't want to see a price crash either....that happened in the early 1990's and people stopped spending on all sorts of things. Businesses went backwards and stopped employing and it became a vicious cycle.
Steady growth is what we need. If you want to buy a house, find an area where you can afford. There are country towns within an hour of most capital cities with homes for less than $200,000 (that's repayments of less than $200pw). Otherwise rent where you want.