How do average Aussies afford homes in the Sydney region these days? It sounds insane:
>Housing Costs Are Pushing People Further Out of Sydney
>Akhilesh Mehta flops into his bus seat and readies himself for the hour-and-a-half commute from his job in central Sydney to his home on the city’s outskirts. As the bus crawls through bumper-to-bumper traffic, the 48-year-old accountant says he puts up with the journey for a simple reason: when it came to buying a family home, the city’s fringes were “the only place I could afford.”
>New South Wales has taken over as Australia’s economic engine as the mining investment boom tails off, with central Sydney contributing almost a quarter of the nation’s growth last fiscal year. That success has come with a price. As workers flock to Sydney, an under-supply of housing, coupled with record-low interest rates, has made the city the world’s second-most expensive property market. Home prices jumped 19 percent in the past 12 months, stoking concern home ownership is increasingly beyond the reach of younger people.
>Sydney’s growing pains are evident in commutes that now rival New York and London.
>The nation is also luring increasing numbers of global millionaires, helping make it one of the fastest growing wealthy nations in the world...
average auckland house prices now are 1.1 million NZD
Christian Perez
>There are several barriers to boosting housing supply in Sydney. The city is bordered by mountains to the west, the ocean to the east and rivers and national parks to the north and south, restricting the supply of new land, while moves to increase housing density in established suburbs have run into opposition from residents.
>That’s meant in the past three years, almost 70 percent of new detached houses have been built more than 30 kilometers (19 miles) from Sydney’s central business district...
>Even those houses don’t come cheap. In Rouse Hill, near where Mehta lives, prices in the new housing estates that dot the once semi-rural area have surged 63 percent since 2012, including a 7.8 percent increase in the 12 months through February, according to data provider CoreLogic Inc.
>“To pay these mortgages, you need to be earning A$120,000 minimum. That means working in the CBD,” said Dean Fribence, who runs a private bus service to the city, offering air-conditioned express coaches to reduce some of the grind of the daily journey. “It’s a vicious circle that can have a huge impact on family life.”
>...the median house price is now 8.4 times average household income, up from 5.8 times 15 years ago, according to CoreLogic.
Ayden Cook
How are salaries? What does an average Aucklander make?
Colton Wilson
maybe 70,000 NZD
Justin Clark
also you need a minimum 20% deposit
Juan Rivera
So how are people affording those prices? Is it all Chinese money and that sort of thing?
Angel Hernandez
>So how are people affording those prices? they aren't the only people buying now are wealthy migrants and property investors and those who earn over 150k a year
Nathan Ross
More like 55k, maybe less - that's about the national median but guess where most of the factory jobs are.
Gabriel Hughes
>More like 55k, maybe less Auckland has far higher wages than the rest of the country
Charles Thomas
People invest in Sydney thinking some chump will pay outrageous rent. Some do some don't. A lot of property is unoccupied. The locals are sitting on gold mines with their 30-60 year old houses. Developers want to turn it into apartments but no one wants that.
Aaron Harris
Were at about $650 in tauranga now
Kayden Miller
the nats now allowing maori to have a say on the RMA is going to fuck up even more development
Cameron Martinez
I should see if I can find some region-specific stats. I might be biased working for a manufacturer (in Auckland), but the factory staff outnumber the office staff 6:1 and mostly earn minimum wage.
Joshua Baker
Fuck em all theyre selling us out and laughing.
Nicholas Ward
most people don't work minimum wage manufacturing jobs now
Ryder Howard
Other figures suggest they are closer to $970,000. Still a ridiculous cost though. I can understand tourist areas like Queenstown being that expensive, but for the major cities it is robbing people of an opportunity for a reasonable standard of living.
Australia and NZ both have the same problem. We need the foreign (predominantly Chinese) money out of our housing markets. Even if it bursts a bubble and temporarily weakens our economy the social cost of unaffordable housing is far too high.
Landon Johnson
Liberals import immigrants Liberals fight against properly expanding the housing supply Liberals fight against properly laying out transportation
Everything turns into a dysfunctional shitfest as people flee the city, and noone has any kids
Brayden Brown
>We need the foreign (predominantly Chinese) money out of our housing markets ours has turned from chinese speculators to chinese migrants now its not a bubble a real lack of physical supply
Henry Richardson
>How do average Aussies afford homes in the Sydney region these days?
By starting out not in Sydney, it isn't anyone's right to live smack bang in the middle of the best city in the world. I own several properties and could afford a Sydney mortgage easily because I didn't start with just 1 massive loan instead building equity over cheaper properties an hour from Sydney.
There's barely any empty properties in Sydney, most my friends pay between $800-$900 a week just for a decent 2 bedroom unit. Demand is to high, go to any open rental and the lines are out the door.
Jaxson Moore
The state of the markets have little to do with chinks and more to do with masses of people falling for the investment meme
The Chinese might pick up the multi-million dollar houses in rich sections of town but masses of people taking out loans they can't afford and picking up things to rent out are what is driving new home buyers out of the market.
Jayden Ramirez
It is a real problem. Most Leftists simultaneously hold multiple contradictory positions. The fact that they are able to dominate media, and play on women's empathy for political gain makes them far more influential than their numbers warrant.
Thomas Reed
That's the thing, this overseas buyer myth. Overseas buyers can only buy brand new properties to drive growth now and it's not slowing down old property prices growing. Go to any Sydney auction and maybe 1 in 5 is a aussie birthed chinese.. Most of the bidding is cashed up white couples wanting that cbd lifestyle.
Go to Melbourne if you want cheap, units in the middle of the CBD for $300k. There's a reason Sydney is priced at what it is.
Bentley King
the chinks were rushing to get there money of china then their gov clamped down on it so now its actual migrants and we are reaching about 70,000 net migrants per year now into nz which has to be one of the highest per capita number in the world
Jaxon Ross
Here we are - according to Stats NZ median income in Auckland was 29.6k in 2013. Do you reckon it's more than doubled in 4 years? Not saying a majority of people are factory workers, but there's plenty of cunts making fuck all still. I don't know how they manage at all.
I think it is a combination of migrants and investors. I suspect a lot of the "migrants" who buy houses here are doing it as a proxy for Chinese nationals.
They talk about "only" 20-25% of house sales in Sydney and Melbourne going directly to foreign buyers. How many migrants are purchasing with money funneled over by relatives in China though?
Investors are motivated by where they can get the best returns. I doubt Chinese investors are only targeting the more expensive end of the housing market. I agree though that negative gearing and the ease of access to bank capital is encouraging a rise in housing prices.
Eli Garcia
That seems like a massive amount for NZ... Considering Australia is still under 500,000 Chinese migrants (we'll probably have hit it now) since 120 years ago.
People don't realise if we opened the flood gates to China they have more millionaires than we have people house prices would double again.
Jace Parker
simple, cucksheds.
Asher Hill
Australia and really any other place that doesn't want massive property bubbles needs to implement property taxes and cut income taxes. Not having it only makes it harder for people actually contributing to the economy. No property taxes means investors can just sit on property with little cost. It's the reason why California housing is so expensive compared to Texas.
Anthony Reed
Median personal income is usually some fraction of median household income, though. MHI is MPI multiplied by the average number of working adults per household.
Robert Cook
Getting rid of the White Australia policy was the first mistake.
All the fucking lebs and gooks are buying up, and average wage earners can't do shit but rent. I'm moving to Tasmania. Fuck this shit.
Cameron Hall
it's going to crash soon fampai
Gavin Flores
Except that is 500,000 migrants with citizenship, their children are not recorded as being 'Chinese migrants". Realistically the number is probably closer to 1 million when you account for children born in Aus.
That is ignoring all the Chinese Australians here on Student Visa's or as permanent residents. We could actually easily have 2 million Chinese in Australia. If you go to Sydney or Melbourne at least 1/5 people you see will be asian.
Joseph Hernandez
The lebs aren't buying shit except for beat up 90s Nissans and tracksuit pants. Gentrification continues to push them to outskirts of Sydney and Melbourne.
Connor Cook
This is a national scandal which is completely fucking over young people. Too many immigrants. Too many bennies breeding like crazy in state houses. Too many regulations preventing new builds. And none of the political parties have the will or the policy to do anything about it.
Jackson Lee
Advertised salaries are not a measure of actual average earnings - it's skewed towards the higher end of salaries and entirely excludes wages (which are generally lower). Trust me - the actual median Auckland earnings are well under 70k.
