Is the Great Australian Dream Still Alive ?

If you buy now on a low income all you are doing is purchasing a property which is not good value for money.

Bwwwwahhhhhhaaa "value for money". The doom and gloom brigade have been telling me personally for 15 years that houses are not good "value for money" and that you should put your money in safe investments such as cash, while waiting for the "big crash"
Keep dreaming whilst you bludge off mum and dad in their house.
 
My son (genY) earlier came for a visit and turned his nose up at a freshly home made soup - everything from the garden apart from garlic. He will go out and BUY his lunch.
Maybe you should tell him the story of the travellers who cleverly made "stone soup" with the help and contributions of the villagers walking by their pot of boiling water and a mere rock which they turned into an awesome soup to be shared by all!! :)
 
The problem with that is, people are far, far more likely to SPEND that extra money on fun stuff than save or invest it. So that argument only actually works for people who are very disciplined tightwads (you know, like lots of people on this forum :D )

I remember Noel Whittaker talking of this scenario a few years ago.

He said that renting and investing was financially better - but most people don't invest the difference.

So, you would assume from this that to buy a house is singularly (for most people) the best investment they can make in the longer term. Some will say super is better; I don't agree.

And that's the key; most people can't make the necessary financial sacrifices to get ahead; whether it be to study harder and do more courses to get the better job, to scrimp harder to get the first IP and so on.

For example; one of my staff refused to do the Roadworthy Testers' Course recently - he is 49. His reason; he is too old and has done enough studying for one lifetime.

Now, I am 50 and HAVE to do it if we are to conduct road-worthies to add another income stream to my business. By the way; the course is quite easy, and can be done from home - I even offered to pay for his course.

And, we will be doing them as soon as we get the accreditation. I will need suitably qualified mechanics to perform them....

If it comes down to having an employee who is qualified to do road-worthies, his lack of commitment might cost him his job (I'm sure it will in actual fact sooner than later).

That's a sacrifice he won't make to better himself financially and make his job more secure, and is making him less valuable to my business.

He is a very nice bloke but sadly - one of the 95%.
 
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I just thought of something else...

Most of my life has not been as a high income earner...had a few years where I was "flying" but that's it.
;)

Which is why you were able to buy into the market WHEN IT WAS CHEAP. I highly doubt you would be able to repeat what you did on a low income today.

You know I am somewhat bemused by the lack of understanding of this very basic fact on these forums. At first I thought it was some sort of way of keyboard warriors trying to inflate the market i.e any bad sentiment will lower prices, now I am really starting to think that maybe you guys just don't understand the basic math ?
 
Which is why you were able to buy into the market WHEN IT WAS CHEAP. I highly doubt you would be able to repeat what you did on a low income today.

You know I am somewhat bemused by the lack of understanding of this very basic fact on these forums. At first I thought it was some sort of way of keyboard warriors trying to inflate the market i.e any bad sentiment will lower prices, now I am really starting to think that maybe you guys just don't understand the basic math ?

we're all bemused by your basic lack of understanding that wages were also low at this time too, along with bank lending, inflation etc.

which means that in the 60s and 70s, house prices were still the same price/income ratio because

1) banks didn't lend more than 80% - period.... most only lent 60-70%.
2) a new, large family car was a year's wage - much like today. you could have bought a hillman or a morris cheaper, much like you could buy a hyundai now.

you've been shown time and time again that it is possible to own a home on a low income in any state. i gave you an example less than 10 posts ago in a mining and tourist area in WA.

i don't think YOU understand the basic premises that

1) not everyone works in the Sydney CBD
2) not everyone WANTS to work in the SYdney CBD
3) there are more markets out there than Inner Sydney and
4) you need to get off your whining, socialist, govt worker behind and source it if you really want it.

/delete/ban.
 
the block has a huge slope on it, but a podium floor and a 2 bed transportable could be done on this for just on $150k.
That slope looks manageable. Mine is on something similar.

The dbl garage is on a slab but the living room level is on piers and the bedroom level is party over the garage and partly on piers. I'm very happy with the result.

Could post a pic, I guess.
 
Which is why you were able to buy into the market WHEN IT WAS CHEAP.

You truly are an idiot, I've decided.

A low income is a low income regardless of whatever point in history you pick.

You simply do not embrace anything or listen to what anyone has to say - even when they can give you past history events.

I - as many others here will have decided by now - have put you on "ignore".
 
That slope looks manageable. Mine is on something similar.

The dbl garage is on a slab but the living room level is on piers and the bedroom level is party over the garage and partly on piers. I'm very happy with the result.

Could post a pic, I guess.

please do! i like seeing sloping block solutions.

but in this instance you've already paid to raise the house, so just park under it.
 
Thesedays I think the self imposed snobery of society and the marketeers have done a superb job of making lives a misery for many and causing undue stress on relationships. The marketeers sell the illusion you can have what you want-the way you want it -when you want it, but reality is different. Wants and needs get blured.

On the otherhand I do honestly sympathise for those who feel short changed in the property game as I do think it is harder now. Ive seen friends and family who I have grown up with struggle dealing with it. I can honestly say if I were just afew years younger and slower I would not be where I am today and many others sitting on large capital gains would also probably agree.
It does pain me to see a growing fault line in society over this issue.

I almost feel guilty, am I alone here?
 
No Guilt

EM,

Guilty or feeling a sense of guilt

1. remorseful awareness of having going something wrong
2. Self-reproach for supposed inadequacy or wrongdoing.

How are the actions or non-actions of others causing you a belief that you have done something wrong. (I realise you said almost guilty)

Are your gains ill gotten? I am assuming the answer is no, so there should be no guilt or even close to guilt.

I appreciate you have a legitimate concern for family and friends who have their own struggles whether self-inflicted, short-sighted or plain unlucky. But the outcome of their position today is made up of many choices, decisions and priorities made every day, often for years, most unknown to us.

Are people who are in situation that you describe in ill-health, incapacitated or genuinely disadvantged? If not, then they make their own way. Some make it quicker than others, some don't make it. Often those who don't or can't seem to find a way, observe these others as having lucked out and why aren't I/can't I do this. It will be someones else's fault. I have had ex-friends who have had this attitude, it permeates their beliefs and can be in extreme examples poisonous.

On your other points, even if you agree with the premise that it is harder now, we are smarter, more educated, have more choices/information than we did way back 'in the past'. Just because one generation did x and get to y doesn't mean this applies now. We often cite the negative traits of Gen Y for example, but they are in the best position to 'skin this cat'. But to get to y, they may need to do 'b' or even 'a & b'. What is constant is there are no short cuts or soft options.

You mention if you were a little bit younger and slower you would not have been in the position that you were. 'If' and sliding door moments. Everyone has them. Most of us think of them in terms of opportunities lost. I would ask why were you able to make that choice at that time? Not, why couldn't others do the same?

And as for consumerism, well, I am guilty as the next person. But a little wiser than 20 years ago I hope. You maybe able to afford the choices you make but can you really justify them. Sometimes life experience and rounded sense of priorities help.
 
A great reply post to EM there, Buzz.

There might be something else in the mix as well when you find yourself 'feeling almost guilty' as a property investor in the absence of any wrongdoing. And that is you may possibly be falling under the influence of a campaign of public deception.

Are property investors really a contributing factor to growing housing unaffordability?

Let's say for a moment they are. Now imagine all of Australia's PIs gradually undertook an orderly withdrawal from the market (and invested in other markets or in other countries).

Would prices fall significantly? Unlikely, because aspiring first home buyers would most likely cease renting and purchase at the first opportunity as they always do.

Would rents drammatically increase? Most likely, because the constantly shrinking pool of available rental properties would be more highly contested by those unable (say, students or low-income workers, etc) or those not disposed (say, transient professionals or bullion 'barons', etc) to purchase residential property.

Ultimately, there would be no rental properties available at all because they would all have been bought up as PPORs. The hotel industry would be laughing!

But then, what would happen to house prices? Well, assuming the population was still growing, house prices would absolutely skyrocket, and first home buyers would indeed become a species of the distant past.

But surely, you answer, building more housing would solve that problem? Of course it would then, just as it would now. And therein lies the fallacy that PIs are a contributing factor to unaffordability today.

The real problem is that our population is growing and nothing is being built to house all these extra people.

Rather than stimulate the residential building industry by withdrawing exorbitant levies and charges that preclude the possibility of building houses being a remotely profitable business today, government creates a minister for housing affordability to promulgate the deception that it is attending to the problem!

And then what next? The government starts cutting down immigration intakes to guarantee our economy has permanent labour shortages (including building workers) going into the future.

Does it make a difference to this broad outline whether Labor or Coalition are at the helm? Not a jot: They're both equally addicted to property taxes, and each just fiddle around the edges a bit differently to improve their appeal to swinging voters.

Still feeling 'almost guilty' for being a property investor? Or utterably nauseated by the duplicity of our political elites?
 
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I think you need to clarify - prices rise in areas where people want to live. No one wants to live in crappy areas like Tarneit or Werribee. But they still go up because people's incomes go up over time and they can borrow more to purchase. But places like Hawthorn and Canterbury keep going strong because both investors and home-owners alike will want to buy there.
 
The Great Australian Dream Is Alive

I think the Great Australian Dream is still alive. It all depends on your expectations.

I bought a place back in 2005 following finishing uni and spending a year saving a deposit. It was a triplex 3x1 villa in an average suburb. Over time I have put in a lot of time and money into making it my 'home'.

I have gone on to buy an investment property but still live in my 'home'. I could probably afford to buy a bigger place in a better suburb but am content living where I am at the moment. I have good neighbours and my small place is all I need to be happy.

Not everybody can live in the biggest house in the bestest suburb. It is more important to live in a 'home'. And you can make any place 'home'.

I think nowadays people spend too much time looking at what other people have (and saying 'I want and deserve what they have too') rather than thinking about how lucky they are at having a roof, their health, friends and family and a job (all of which I feel I am fortunate at having).

OzK
 
ok so just so i understand, in order to 'live the australian dream', people must
(a) stay at home and buy an investment property in order to get on the property ladder
(b) stay in whoop whoop land
(c) live like a pauper in order to finance the property.

I'm sorry but i am hearing very few arguments from the 'pro-property' side to support validity that the 'australian dream' is still alive.

This sought of stuff is not hard, if one is on a decent income (not huge but decent) and one cant find 'reasonable' property with a reasonable deposit, and be able to finance with 'reasonable' repayments, then patience is the order of the day.

Every asset moves through cycles, and so does property.
 
Can we 1st define what the ‘Australian Dream’ is? Is it still 1000sqm block 10kms from CBD and beach? If so, then yes, the Australian Dream is dead...
 
Can we 1st define what the ‘Australian Dream’ is? Is it still 1000sqm block 10kms from CBD and beach? If so, then yes, the Australian Dream is dead...
Gee, my understanding of the "great Australian dream" was always about home ownership, that is, a roof over one's head, not an investment property (though this would be cream) and regardless of its size or location!
 
Gee, my understanding of the "great Australian dream" was always about home ownership, that is, a roof over one's head, not an investment property (though this would be cream) and regardless of its size or location!

in this case it is definitely still alive!
 
Can we 1st define what the ‘Australian Dream’ is? Is it still 1000sqm block 10kms from CBD and beach? If so, then yes, the Australian Dream is dead...

I don't think this was ever the "Australian Dream". As Monopoly says, owning a home was the dream, not necessarily on a big block, close to CBD and beach.
 
1000sqm is actually really big. I have a 610 and 650 block and both seem a nice size (although more space for fruit trees or a BIG shed would be nice too) and when it was one big yard combined it was irritatingly huge. 800 would be lovely :) There are a lot of 4000sqm blocks in my town and without exception the house has about 800-1000sqm fenced off and landscaped and the other 3000sqm around the edge is bare dirt with a sheep (or roundup) to keep the weeds down. Yet the REA ad always harps on about how fantastic an acre is despite evidence to the contrary right in front of them.

The dream is definitely a house with a yard though, not a unit. Even if you're talking a 250sqm+garage house on a 400sqm block, which seems to be the average these days.
 
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