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Short filmTranscript
00:00Congratulations on your home purchase, Mr. Humphreys.
00:15I know you'll be very happy in this community.
00:17And here are your keys.
00:19We did it.
00:20Oh, God.
00:21I'm so glad we're done with renting.
00:22Finally, some stability, you know?
00:24No more emails to landlords about mould.
00:27No more rent increases.
00:28Aha.
00:29Well, it is my honour to present this to you from all of us at Ray Hooker.
00:33Finally, we can put a nail in the wall for a painting.
00:36Yes.
00:37Wait, wait, wait.
00:38Is that your deposit?
00:39Like, all of it?
00:40Yeah, the bank said that was enough.
00:42Oh.
00:43You've got to be joking.
00:44That?
00:45What?
00:46Oi, come and look at this dickhead's deposit.
00:49Where's the rest of it, you dickhead?
00:51And where are your pants?
00:53Hang on.
00:55This is a dream, isn't it?
00:57Yeah, as if you'd be able to afford a home.
00:59Obviously, it's a dream, as if I'd be married to you.
01:02But if a D-grade celebrity like me can't afford a home, then who can?
01:06That's why it's called the Australian Dream, mate.
01:09That's the only place you can afford it.
01:11Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
01:13Fucking breakfast and great news for mortgage holders with a reserve bank keeping it...
01:17..right...
01:22Call me a dickhead.
01:24Well, at least it's Saturday.
01:27Oh, no, it's Saturday.
01:30Owning a home might be the dream, but I'm living my actual nightmare trying to find a rental property in the middle of a housing crisis.
01:37crisis and that means one thing. Queuing. For the last few weeks I've been stuck in queues like this
01:44and it's not even a good queue like a queue to buy the new iPhone or a dessert that's blown up
01:49on TikTok. No, this is a queue to find some place to live and I'm not alone. I mean that's the nature
01:55of a queue but I'm also not alone and feeling, what's the delicate way of putting this, pretty
02:00bloody annoyed. What is your current housing situation? We currently rent. I am a renter.
02:07Living with three renters. How many places do you think you've seen? Probably 25. 40 and 50 of them.
02:13What sort of place are you able to afford on a nurse's salary? A mouldy place. Landlords don't
02:19really care about maintaining the place. I've got water pouring in my apartment. Just had two
02:26coberts and a microwave. That's what it was and it was 560 a week. It felt like that if we all jumped up
02:33and landed the house would just fall apart. And I'm still having to move out because they're putting
02:37the rent up. Almost a third of people, including myself, are renters and that figure is climbing.
02:45As for rents, they've shot up by over a third since COVID. At the same time, house prices are rising and
02:52rising, leaving us with little chance of buying, possibly ever. So what the hell has led to this
02:58housing crisis? How can we solve it?
03:10One person has become synonymous with the debate on housing in Australia. And that name is...
03:16Really? That's his name?
03:18Purple Pingers. I don't know what that means, but he runs the shit rentals database. To be clear,
03:24it's the rentals that are shit, not the database. It helps highlight the plight of renters and the
03:29dumps they're forced to live in. Hello, welcome back to Shit Rentals with your host Purple.
03:33Mr Pingers has built himself a huge social media following. Reminds me of that prison in Iraq where
03:39they tortured all those people. What was shit about your rental? A couple of rats. A couple of them?
03:45Yeah, like, honestly, fine. Worst things have happened to better people.
03:49So what are the standout horror stories from the shit rentals?
03:52There's this one guy reached out, uh, and he was like on the phone, nicest guy I've probably ever
03:58spoken to. Uh, and he's like, you, man, you gotta come see this. You like squelch down through the
04:05house. We go into the shower. Check where the shower drains to.
04:09We went out the back. The entire shed is made of espaces, which is fantastic.
04:16And he was like, we just got a rent increase. But he was like, you know, we have a deal.
04:22I live in a shit hole. You don't increase my rent. We had a deal. You slowly kill me.
04:28Yeah. But under. But for free.
04:30Almost. There's a cap on it. Yeah.
04:32Oh man. Okay. So. But is that just the price you pay for wanting to live in the city?
04:37Or is the problem more widespread?
04:44Well, Parramatta. 26 k's from the centre of Sydney. A house up for sale. But for now,
04:51it's being leased out. The owner hasn't done any, haven't done any renovation here. The walls
04:55hasn't been painted or peeling, uh, which is the beauty of the home. At the moment, we have six
05:02rooms here. Each room between 250 to 300. All the rooms have the shared shower here. They've got
05:08shared kitchen. Most of the people they're renting here, they're new arrival to Australia. They don't
05:13have much money. We've got students close to university. And we've got nurses close to Westman
05:19Hospital. We've got another toilet here. It's very funny. Four years ago, it was in, uh, the best building
05:25in Parramatta, which was Meryton, um, two bedroom, two bathroom, used to go $5.50 per week. And now,
05:31two bedroom there, it goes $1,000 a week.
05:36Well, that was bleak. Next time you're being taken care of by a nurse, think about where they're going
05:39back to after their 20-hour shift. As if the queues, the rising prices, the real estate agents,
05:45the bidding against other renters, the wasted Saturdays, wasn't bad enough. And then to top it
05:50all off, you've got those people who say to you, why don't you just buy a house? Oh yeah,
05:55because that's easy. We had that dream of buying an old place and doing it up,
06:00but it's just, just unaffordable now. To buy an average property in Sydney costs 13 times what
06:05the average income is, which is just not really tenable. I asked some of my friends how they had
06:11done it and covered their identity so they'd be more honest. Look, my wife and I worked really hard.
06:17We were both working, we were quite young and we saved up a substantial deposit. It was really
06:22down to our hard work. We had both been saving for almost, I reckon, 15 years. I got my place by
06:30staying at home until I could afford it. Did you receive any help? Well, I mean, my parents did kick
06:37in some money. I did get a little bit of help from mum and dad. Yeah, we got a big chunk when my
06:43partner's dad died in like a hundred grand or so, but that's not like that was the most important.
06:48But, Mark, what the hell are you doing? But who can blame them? Recent data shows that 60% of first
06:56home buyers rely on the bank of mum and dad. It's so popular, in fact, that if it were a real bank,
07:03it's estimated the bank of mum and dad would be somewhere between the fifth and ninth largest lender
07:08in the country. It would also definitely have the worst app. I mean, just think of the font size.
07:14And the application process would be a nightmare, as I found out with my own dad.
07:18Take a seat. Now, I'll need you to fill out these forms.
07:24Hang on, what are these? Just standard documents. Mark, is it?
07:29Yeah. Now, I'll need your last two tax returns, a list of assets and liabilities, and a bank statement.
07:38Wait, what? What's your current employment?
07:42Well, I'm currently hosting this documentary.
07:44What, they couldn't get Miriam Margulies for this? Dependents?
07:50Just your grandchildren. Credit history?
07:53No debts that I'm aware of. Oh, there's that ticker Masai you owe me for.
08:02Mr Humphreys, no, I'm afraid we'll not be able to provide you with a loan at this stage.
08:06Oh, what? Why not? Well, I'm renting too. Oh, f***.
08:14If the bank of mum and dad isn't an option, you're really in trouble.
08:18Property, or homes, have just become so out of reach that it's locking out the next
08:22generation. The average person stepping out of renting into home ownership has to save 150
08:28or even 200 grand in the big cities, and they have to do that while paying rental costs,
08:33which climb higher than wages do each year.
08:36So, who do we blame for the inflated cost of housing?
08:39The agencies or the landlords are they increasing the prices.
08:43Falls back onto the politicians. Foreign investment, perhaps.
08:46Well, I know which one flies best on the news.
08:49Foreign investors. Foreign investors. Foreign investors. Foreign cash.
08:52Foreign buyers. Are extremely wealthy.
08:54So you're quite right. Are these missing out?
09:07Monica, too, is a celebrity real estate agent who primarily looks after ultra high net worth
09:12Chinese buyers. And yet, she's clearly on Struggle Street. I mean, her car's missing a roof.
09:17Are you Mark? I'm Mark. Hello, how do you do?
09:20Oh, good to see you. You come and check out the house?
09:21Yeah, I'm now checking out the car. Nice little wheel.
09:24On this one, come over the house.
09:26Okay. 100%.
09:27Good to know. You're going to show me around the luxury property.
09:29Look at that. Oh, man.
09:32Oh, la, la, la. The guide price for sale is $13.5 million.
09:39And, um, to rent, probably about, we don't want to rent it, obviously.
09:44Well, but hypothetically.
09:444,500. Wow, you're really tall.
09:464,500 per month?
09:48Per week.
09:54I think that's probably a very good feng shui.
09:57You have good water. You can hear that incredible sound.
10:00I've seen rentals that have leaks like that, but this is slightly different.
10:03Have a look here. A butler's kitchen.
10:06So you can have your, like, a soy sauce here, you know, or you don't go to your
10:10so vegemi, whatever that is.
10:11I can have soy sauce.
10:14I think the wine collection is more than I have for a house deposit.
10:17Change your profession. Maybe you should be a real estate agent.
10:21I think there is a lesson to this, yeah.
10:24So overseas buyers are most of your clients?
10:27So for people to buy a house like this, which is established,
10:32only Australian residents or citizens can buy, even though they probably work overseas,
10:37or maybe they just come to Australia, but they have to be a permanent resident or citizen.
10:44For my clients, a lot of them are Chinese, of course, because look at me, I'm Chinese.
10:51So maybe currently they're still in China or somewhere else, right?
10:55But they definitely come back to live.
10:57Because if you buy the house, you don't live here,
11:00you have to pay a lot of money in terms of land tax and surcharge.
11:04Mm-hmm.
11:05I'll just give you a figure.
11:06So this is from a financial review, right?
11:09Two years, 23 to 24, property sold to, like, foreign buyers is less than 1%.
11:16Less than 1%?
11:18I don't know what impact we make for foreign investors.
11:25Foreign buyers not being able to buy existing homes, huge taxes, I had no idea.
11:30And less than 1% of sales?
11:32Gee whiz.
11:36I thought I'd cross-check these claims that foreign investors aren't a major reason for rising housing
11:41costs with someone who wasn't a celebrity real estate agent.
11:44Statistically, yes.
11:47Less than 1% of home sales typically in a year are to foreign investors.
11:53And so, obviously, that's a minor impact on the market.
11:57Do you hear any anecdotal suggestions that perhaps there is actually a greater
12:02percentage of foreign investors, but they're just doing it through more secretive means?
12:08Look, I have heard people tell me that there's a lot of foreign investors and they go to
12:14auctions, for instance, and that's how they know.
12:17I'm always amazed at their, you know, x-ray vision to be able to recognise someone's citizenship,
12:23you know, just by looking.
12:25Passport controllers at every option, isn't it?
12:29So, if it's not wealthy foreign investors driving up prices,
12:32is it other newcomers coming to our shores?
12:35You do hear a lot of people saying that immigration has an impact on house prices.
12:38What do you say to that?
12:39Well, absolutely, housing demand is in part driven by population growth.
12:46And in Australia, our population growth is driven 50-50 by, you know, natural increase,
12:51as well as by immigration.
12:53So, we do need to keep housing supply on the boil.
12:58But can we blame that population growth for the escalation in house prices?
13:04You know, if we could, then we would have seen during the COVID period,
13:09a dramatic reversal of house prices.
13:12In fact, population growth went backwards when we closed the borders,
13:18but house prices actually galloped away higher than ever.
13:22In fact, I think they rose by more than a trillion
13:25in terms of the value of our housing stock over that period of time.
13:30We can't blame migration for that.
13:35So, if I can't just blame immigrants, who else is there to blame?
13:39To find new culprits, I'm on my way to an auction in Blacktown.
13:43It's a renovator's dream. Real estate talk for another shithole.
13:48The only kind of place that first home buyers like me have a shot at.
13:52And it's also popular with property investors.
13:54$820,000. Bitter number two is the opening bid. Where do we go from here?
13:58The air was thick with the hopes and dreams of first home buyers.
14:02What do you need to be focused?
14:03You're going to lose it for a thousand bucks?
14:05We'll bring you an espresso.
14:07But apparently, you can't buy a house with hopes and dreams.
14:10At $996,000, sold.
14:14So this one went to a property investor.
14:17Congratulations, bidder number 17.
14:19Not the first home buyers.
14:21We're trying to get in the market with my brother to get a bit of a head start.
14:26It feels like it should be easier if you're, you know, working really hard when you're young.
14:31But it just doesn't feel like it's fully the case.
14:34I'm not sure that without mum and dad's help, this generation is going to have their own place.
14:39Because I don't want them at home forever. Put it that way. I want my life back.
14:44This auction is just another example of something that happens every weekend in Australia.
14:49Investors beating out first home buyers.
14:53Every year, Australian investors buy more homes than first-time buyers do.
14:58Sometimes investors who already have two, three, four or more properties.
15:04Sometimes a lot more.
15:05Can I ask you out of interest, how many rental properties do you own?
15:08283.
15:10283 rental properties?
15:13Yeah.
15:16My research team has managed to track down one of these evil investors,
15:19and I'm going to confront them.
15:21Like 71% of Australian investors, she has two properties.
15:25Which may not seem like much, but it's two more than me.
15:28I can't even get one house.
15:29Alright, let's go meet one of these property hoarders.
15:34Oh, hi, Mark.
15:42Narelle, you're the evil, I mean, you're the investor?
15:46Oh, okay.
15:47Can I come in?
15:48You sure can.
15:49My interview with a heartless boomer investor was off to a bad start.
15:57Not only did Narelle and I used to work together, she'd prepared tea and some lovely snacks.
16:05Narelle?
16:05Yes?
16:05Evil investor, thank you for the tea.
16:08How many properties do you own?
16:09Uh, this one and one around the corner that I lived in before this one.
16:14And it's because I met somebody and we ended up buying somewhere a little bit bigger.
16:18And so that's kind of like the way things went.
16:20Do you think it's harder for people today to buy their first home than it was when you thought
16:25bought your first?
16:25Oh, most definitely.
16:26Everyone goes, oh, the Keating years, you know, 17% interest.
16:29It was 17% on, do you want to know how much it was?
16:32It was just pathetic.
16:33$54,000.
16:35Wow.
16:36I know.
16:36So really, that's so upsetting.
16:38$54,000 for a flat?
16:39Yeah.
16:40In Sydney?
16:40Yeah.
16:41Australia?
16:41Yes.
16:42Because that's what it was.
16:43But do you feel any guilt about owning multiple properties when so many Australians don't even own one?
16:50I do have these thoughts, but the reality is a lot of people need to rent.
16:54But yes, it also earns me money, you know, so that's exactly why one would do it.
16:59It's kind of hard to make sense of the fact that Australia is probably full of people like
17:06Narelle, a lovely and considerate person who has invested not because she wanted to be some
17:11kind of land baron, but because it made economic sense to do so, because we have somehow set up
17:17a system that encourages people to view housing as a way to make money.
17:24But has it always been like this?
17:26When the British first landed here, they just stole the land off the Indigenous people.
17:30First, they took Eora and Darug country, then they took the lot.
17:35Even ex-convicts were given free land.
17:3830 acres and 10 more for every child you had.
17:41Oh, let's have another baby, Elspeth.
17:43I want a media room.
17:45After World War I, cheap loans were offered to war veterans, unless you're an Aboriginal veteran.
17:51But an even bigger boost for most people was the government freezing rents in the war years
17:57and putting price controls on homes and land.
18:00In fact, for 60 years up until 1950, house prices in Australia were actually flat.
18:07Wow.
18:08So there was a time when stopping rents and house prices from climbing was something the
18:13government wanted to do.
18:15But fast forward a few decades.
18:17And by then, we all wanted our own home.
18:22At the end of the day, it's still about security.
18:24Hey, that's Ray Martin!
18:24It's about having your own place.
18:26That's important to us.
18:28Owning your own home seems to make life complete.
18:30So at this twilight end of our century, the great Aussie dream is still alive and well.
18:35It's just...
18:36What?
18:37When was this?
18:391999.
18:40The great Aussie dream is still alive and well.
18:42Well, it's bloody dead now.
18:44Was Ray Martin lying to us?
18:46Surely not five-time gold-logie winner Ray Martin.
18:48If you can trust anyone, you can trust Ray Martin.
18:50I'm going to call them.
18:51We're actually quite good friends.
18:53Well, we share a hairdresser.
18:59Hi, this is Ray.
19:01Probably call me backwards.
19:02But I know that Ray couldn't have lied to us.
19:04There must be some other explanation.
19:20There must be some other details.
19:21There must be some other details.
19:22There must be some other details.
19:23There must be some other details.
19:24There must be some other details.
19:25There must be some other details.
19:26Oh my god.
19:27Ray wasn't lying.
19:281999 was the turning point.
19:31Within a couple of years, house prices started to skyrocket.
19:34You see, in 1999, the government changed laws around capital gains tax.
19:39Now, that's when the tax on the gains from the capital...
19:45Sorry, this is too complex.
19:47You know how in the movie The Big Short,
19:48how they had Margot Robbie in a bathtub to explain all the financial stuff?
19:52Could we get Margot Robbie in the bathtub?
19:54No.
19:54What about Nicole Kidman?
19:55Does she understand capital gains tax?
19:58Well, who can we get?
20:01Thankfully, we were able to find someone with the right mix of economic literacy
20:05and undeniable sex appeal. Financial journalist, Alan Colwer.
20:09Now, the capital gains tax is the tax on profits you make
20:13from investments like shares and property.
20:15Way back in 1999, three wealthy businessmen recommended to the Howard government
20:19that they replace the existing adjustment for inflation in the capital gains tax
20:23with a 50% discount.
20:25Australia already had another type of tax deduction called negative gearing.
20:30With negative gearing, if your property expenses are higher than your rental income,
20:34you can offset those losses against your normal tax bill.
20:39So you end up paying less tax.
20:41So when negative gearing was joined by a 50% discount on capital gains tax,
20:45it supercharged the perceived benefits of owning property.
20:50A few other things happened at the same time as well, but together,
20:54it made house prices start to shoot up.
20:57Housing was no longer seen as just a shelter, a place to live.
21:00It was also an investment and the best way to build wealth.
21:09And also, I mean that the taxpayer, like you,
21:12basically give a $96 billion subsidy to those that can buy houses.
21:16Got it?
21:17Good.
21:18Now, bugger off.
21:20I thought Alan was just another madman raving in a bathtub.
21:25But it turns out he's right.
21:27This is the Ralph Report, named after one of the three wealthy business people,
21:32John Ralph, former CEO of Rio Tinto and head of the Business Council of Australia.
21:37These three men suggested the changes to tax laws, which they said would help business investment.
21:43But it led to house prices skyrocketing.
21:49Let's just check that.
21:54Mark?
21:54Alan, didn't anyone warn them about what could happen to house prices?
21:58Well, one person did have the foresight to see what would happen,
22:01but you're not going to like the answer.
22:02It was Mark Latham.
22:05How are you, Mark?
22:05Good, good. How are you, sir?
22:06Mark Latham?
22:08Once Labor leader turned disgraced former Labor leader,
22:11turned New South Wales leader of Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party,
22:15turned disgraced former New South Wales leader of Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party,
22:19turned disgraced independent?
22:21But maybe he got one thing right?
22:23This is a multi-billion dollar free kick for the rich.
22:26It will add through these shoddy capital gains tax proposals to the great Australian disease
22:32of asset and property speculation, particularly in our big cities.
22:36It will take away resources from the knowledge economy
22:39and put them into the least productive, least honourable aspects
22:43of Australian economic activity.
22:46But if Mark Latham was right about that, then maybe he's right about something else.
22:49Most funeral services pride themselves on their contract.
22:52So-called comedian Mark Humphreys.
22:54As funny as a burning orphanage.
22:56Natural born shits his pants, coward.
22:59Alan, there must have been someone else who spoke out about this.
23:02Preferably someone who hasn't called me a shits his pants coward.
23:05Well, that rules out quite a lot of people, Mark.
23:09If this whole housing debacle was created by a report to our leaders from a trio of business people,
23:15maybe we can fix it if we deliver a report from a trio of renters
23:18struggling to get into the housing market.
23:20Mayor Ziz heads up a leading campaign group.
23:23Everybody's Home is a campaign to fix Australia's housing crisis
23:26and make housing more affordable.
23:28We're made up of 500 different organisations that work on the front lines of the housing crisis.
23:33But we're also made up of 42,000 average Australians who have signed up to the campaign because
23:39they're sick of not seeing action on housing affordability.
23:42Housing is the key to fixing every aspect of people's lives.
23:45So you're not going to be able to deal with any issue that you've got going on in your life
23:49unless you have stable housing.
23:50You're both renters?
23:51Yes.
23:52So Jess, tell me a little bit about your rental situation.
23:55I was homeless and I didn't have a job and I was sleeping on the streets.
23:59And then they got me into a refuge and it was enough to get me back on my feet
24:03and into more permanent housing.
24:04I'm back at uni too.
24:06It's looking like I'm actually doing...
24:07I did really well last semester, not to boast, but I did.
24:11I was very proud of myself.
24:14It's all because I've got housing.
24:15I have something to go home to at the end of the day and that matters.
24:18So what are the changes that you'd like to see happen?
24:21We want to see tax handouts for investors really wound back.
24:24So that's the capital gains tax discount for investors
24:28and also negative gearing tax deductions.
24:31Right, what would you say to those people who would say that,
24:33oh, if you make those changes, then, you know,
24:35that takes another rental out of the market?
24:38Yeah, I mean, houses don't dematerialise when a landlord sells them.
24:42You know, a first home buyer will buy that and that's, you know,
24:44a person who wants to live in that home will buy it.
24:47But the other thing...
24:47Have you said that people who want to live in the house might actually buy it?
24:51Exactly.
24:51Yeah, who would have thought?
24:52I haven't come across that in this documentary.
24:55Do you have some sort of report we can take it apart?
24:57We do have a report.
24:58We have this report.
24:59The renter's report.
25:00Which says, yeah, exactly what needs to change.
25:03Can I make one change?
25:04Because they only listen to wealthy businessmen
25:06and I don't think any of us are.
25:08We just put this sticker on.
25:10Yeah.
25:10For our report two.
25:11Much better, yeah.
25:12I don't think we've got a better chance.
25:13All right, let's go.
25:14And so we went to take our report to Parliament.
25:19This is the piece of documentation that we've got.
25:21Or at least we tried to.
25:22It seems that even though we've named our report after wealthy business people,
25:26we may not look like them.
25:28So we're struggling to get in.
25:29I'm not throwing.
25:30I just saw you clicking there.
25:31I'm literally not.
25:33But then somebody let us in the back door and we managed to find a politician who was willing
25:37to speak to us.
25:38David Shoebridge from the Greens.
25:40Housing is a human right.
25:41It's Article 25 of the United Nations human right.
25:44It's a basic human need.
25:45We're not asking for, you know, gold or jewels.
25:48We just want somewhere to live.
25:49Absolutely.
25:50And I think, you know, country as wealthy as ours, it is kind of a fundamental right
25:55that you should be absolutely guaranteed.
25:58I'd like to see housing treated more as a human right rather than as an investment vehicle.
26:02And if you want to do that, you've actually got to change things like the capital gains tax
26:06discount, which set it up as an investment.
26:0960% of people own or have a mortgage.
26:11And so they're looking after the majority, tweak the tax system, have a genuine conversation
26:16about immigration and population, somehow tie that to housing.
26:20These are tough conversations.
26:21And from what I've seen, the major parties aren't yet ready to have it.
26:26The challenge is, can we convince other politicians not named David?
26:30I think that's the big challenge.
26:34Although that might not be the biggest challenge.
26:36While there are a lot of Davids in Parliament, at the last count seven,
26:40there are a lot more of another category, property investors.
26:44In the last parliament, 147 politicians had at least two properties.
26:49That's 65% of them.
26:51A couple even had seven.
26:53So it may be an uphill battle to change this.
26:56But I've given them a report.
26:58My job is done.
26:59Well, it's so great that we've managed to get this report into parliament with
27:02some changes to capital gains and negative gearing.
27:05And what's this other stuff?
27:07There's a bit more.
27:09There's a bit more we have to do besides fix the tax system.
27:11Step one.
27:12The other thing we need to do is get government back into housing.
27:14So we need social housing.
27:16We need like 940,000 social homes over the next 20 years.
27:21It's not a small thing.
27:22And we also need to make renting a viable option for people.
27:25We need to do something to make renting stable.
27:27We need to make leases longer term.
27:29We need to limit these unfair rent increases.
27:31And we need to give people minimum standards in rental homes.
27:35Excuse me.
27:35I just need to make a phone call.
27:37Alan, is it true that even if we fix capital gains tax and negative gearing,
27:41there's still other things we need to fix?
27:42Well, it's a big part of the problem,
27:44but there's no one silver bullet to make up for years of neglect.
27:48Are you still in the bath?
27:50No comment.
27:53The minor parties and independents clearly believe tax changes are necessary,
27:57but the major parties are just not on board.
28:04It wasn't that long ago that one of the major party leaders actively campaigned
28:08on changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax.
28:11Former Labor leader Bill Shorten took tax changes on housing to two elections,
28:16but he lost and now he's left politics.
28:19I wonder where he is now.
28:21Oh, there he is.
28:27Once I got the one-time contender for prime minister off the phone,
28:37he agreed to an interview.
28:39What was the debate like within the Labor Party about introducing those policies?
28:44There was some trepidation that you can't talk about changing housing tax policy.
28:50You know, you'd electrify yourself on it.
28:53I have a view that in Australia, our tax system
28:56discriminates against the pay-as-you-go earner and favours those with property.
29:03How is it fair that the people repairing your cars,
29:06the people looking after your sick kids or teachers and firefighters,
29:10pay more tax than someone who just happens to have enough starting capital
29:15to buy a lazy investment, which does nothing,
29:18and just increases in value and you get to keep it?
29:21Do you go along with the narrative that it lost you those elections or was it the sausage?
29:27Well, the sausage was never the problem. The bread was quite hard though.
29:30Um, that bread roll, if you'd just eaten it in the traditional end-on way,
29:35you'd have needed teeth like jaws.
29:37I hear. I sometimes just rip it off.
29:39Just go full protein, skip the carb.
29:41I just go straight in.
29:42But we digress. No, because we had our negative gearing policies in 2016
29:46and capital gains changes then. And we won 15 seats.
29:50Do you think the appetite for change within federal parliament is gone for those changes?
29:55I don't know. Certainly there was a lot of scar tissue after 2019.
30:00Everyone seemed on board up to about 8pm on the election night.
30:03Afterwards, I was a bit lonely where apparently no-one except me ever wanted to do this.
30:08Do you think politicians are afraid to return to changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax?
30:17I think, though, it's easier politically to focus on supply and not the tax system.
30:23Which is exactly what happened at the 2025 election.
30:26And we've made no changes to negative gearing or capital gains tax.
30:30The key, of course, is supply.
30:32That brings the supply of housing on, which is really important.
30:35See? But you know what? At this point, I'm looking for solutions.
30:39And if the first one is clearly going to be supply, or building houses,
30:43well, let's get to it. And fast. But how?
30:52Printing our houses is one new way of increasing supply quickly.
30:57Now, that might seem pretty far-fetched,
30:59but there was a time when photocopying your ass would have seemed pretty far-fetched too.
31:05Nick Holden has been printing houses for six years now,
31:08and I wanted to see if they actually stack up. Like, literally.
31:13So how long did this take to build, and how does that compare to a traditional build?
31:16We would have printed this in eight days.
31:19Eight days to print?
31:20Correct. On this one particular side.
31:22OK. And if you were to do traditional methods, what would that be?
31:26Nick Holden Oh, wow. A lot longer. You know, yeah.
31:28Probably triple that amount of time to get it to this level, or even more,
31:31because I don't know if I could think of a more inefficient way to build.
31:34Nick Holden Right.
31:35Nick Holden So you can imagine, traditionally,
31:36you've got a guy with a pile of bricks down here,
31:38his mate's carrying them down there, and you're laying brick by block by block by block.
31:42Nick Holden Do bricklayers hate you?
31:44Nick Holden No, they're not around anymore.
31:46So that's it. It's hard to get one.
31:48Nick Holden You're paying them more than a surgeon when you can get them.
31:51But it's worked. You know, it's got us where we are, but it's time to automate.
31:54Nick Holden Yeah, right.
31:54Nick Holden So we're almost three times faster,
31:56with less people involved.
31:57Nick Holden And your team is just a bunch of nerds?
32:00Nick Holden Yeah, techies, not tradies.
32:01Nick Holden Right. OK, gotcha.
32:10Nick Holden The top here is a composite panel system,
32:12so the hole upstairs for two days to put up.
32:14Nick Holden Your time-lapse videos must be super quick.
32:16Nick Holden Printing houses may seem far-fetched,
32:22but we need to be throwing everything at this problem, because at the same time,
32:26we're trying to build more houses. We're also losing them, thanks to climate change.
32:30Nick Holden The worst bushfire crisis in the state's history.
32:34Nick Holden An historic flood crisis,
32:36with thousands of people stranded, homes inundated, as the city sees its worst flooding in its history.
32:42Nick Holden That's the Wilson River.
32:46Nick Holden It may not look like much now,
32:47but in 2022, it rose above this bridge to trash the northern New South Wales town of Lismore.
32:54Nick Holden Over a quarter of private homes were impacted,
32:58and more than one in five were so damaged, they were uninhabitable.
33:02Nick Holden Thousands of people were left looking for homes practically overnight.
33:06Nick Holden In a place like Lismore, the housing crisis has been accelerated.
33:11Nick Holden The government is having to step in,
33:13by getting more land released and building new homes.
33:17Nick Holden It's an opportunity for a fresh start.
33:19Nick Holden They're not just building differently,
33:20they're also trying out a new model of renting at the same time.
33:24Nick Holden It's called Build to Rent.
33:25Nick Holden Build to Rent, it's purpose-built rental accommodation.
33:30Nick Holden Yeah, so it's permanent rental,
33:32in and amongst the build to rent component that is also a 20% affordable housing component.
33:37Nick Holden I just need to check, so if 20% is affordable,
33:39Nick Holden It doesn't mean the other 80% is unaffordable, does it?
33:42Nick Holden Well, it is for low to moderate income
33:44earners, absolutely, and I guess it's based on the needs of the area.
33:48Nick Holden And so how many units are you building here?
33:50Nick Holden So on this particular parcel of land,
33:52which is about four and a half thousand square meters,
33:55we're building 50 apartments. Because it's purpose-built accommodation,
33:59and it's held by one owner at Lancom, then it provides tenants with surety on their tenure.
34:04Nick Holden For example, a landlord is not going to come and say,
34:07I'm selling the apartment, or I need the apartment back. It allows the tenants to,
34:11you know, hang a picture on the wall and call the place home.
34:15Nick Holden Unheard of, unheard of.
34:16Nick Holden Who do you blame for the housing crisis?
34:19Nick Holden Where do you think we went wrong as a country?
34:20Nick Holden I think it's a generational thing, really.
34:23Nick Holden Which generation? Name them.
34:24Nick Holden Oh.
34:27Nick Holden Starts with a B, ends with an A B boomer.
34:30Nick Holden It's great the government is building rental properties,
34:36and making sure at least some are actually affordable.
34:39Nick Holden But why doesn't the government build houses
34:40and make them all affordable to the scale it used to?
34:43Nick Holden Our leaders once spent big on building public housing.
34:48Nick Holden They believed providing shelter for everyone
34:51was too important to be left to the private sector alone.
34:53Nick Holden What's changed?
34:55Nick Holden Australia used to build public housing on a scale unimaginable today.
35:01Nick Holden It's a neat little home,
35:02one of thousands badly needed in this city.
35:04Nick Holden The young married couples desperately home hungry.
35:07Nick Holden The government has pledged to build 90,000 houses.
35:09Nick Holden Right after World War II,
35:11over 20% of all new homes were public housing.
35:15Nick Holden And at Heidelberg will be an estate of 4,500 homes.
35:19Nick Holden But former Liberal PM Robert Menzies
35:21Nick Holden Began the mass sell-off of public housing
35:24to encourage Australians to become what he called little capitalists.
35:29Nick Holden And hope someday to sit under their own vine and fig trees.
35:34Nick Holden Home ownership rates skyrocketed,
35:37whereas public housing declined steadily.
35:40Less than 4% of Australians now call it home.
35:42Nick Holden Those that can get a spot in our remaining public housing,
35:48Nick Holden Benefit greatly, like Norrie.
35:51Norrie I like that these are our forever homes.
35:53Norrie I like that these are our forever homes.
35:54Norrie We're the people that may have been knocked around by life,
35:56Norrie We give each other a lot of grace, space.
35:59Nick Holden That must be lovely to be part of a community.
36:01Nick Holden I think, you know, speaking of someone who
36:03really don't know my neighbours, it's lovely to see, you know,
36:06an environment where people do know each other.
36:08Norrie Very much so.
36:09Nick Holden I think I've moved five places in the last six years.
36:13So what is about to happen here?
36:14Norrie Well, this area is currently 100%
36:18public land and public housing built on it.
36:21Nick Holden The proposal from the government
36:22is to change that over so 50% private houses on it.
36:26Nick Holden And I think 20% affordable
36:28and 30% social housing.
36:30Nick Holden Having public housing is winning the lottery in life.
36:34Nick Holden Yeah.
36:34Nick Holden You're guaranteed a roof over your head.
36:36Nick Holden You said that this was supposed to be
36:38your forever home, but that's now not going to be the case.
36:41Nick Holden So do you know what's going to happen to you?
36:43Nick Holden No one likes moving house.
36:45Nick Holden We've been promised if we want to stay in the area we can,
36:49but I don't know where else they're going to put a lot of us.
36:51Nick Holden I hope that my next place is my forever home.
36:54Nick Holden Chipping away at the public housing model is something
37:03happening across our major cities. And while Norrie may have a place to go for now,
37:08so many people their age are being thrown back into the rental market.
37:1250, 60 year olds who don't have a home and have to battle to pay for a roof over their head.
37:19And what makes all of this worse is that the government says there's a supply problem,
37:23but we're not even using the homes we've already built.
37:26Nick Holden In the midst of a housing crisis,
37:28there are homes sitting empty all over the country.
37:33And I'm about to meet a group of people with a pretty radical solution.
37:42This is a vacant property in Melbourne suburbs, where squatters are taking the housing crisis
37:47into their own hands and moving in without the owner's permission.
37:52Nick Holden I don't really know what to expect.
37:53I'm guessing, I don't know, graffiti and boarded up windows. I really don't know.
37:58So, um, yeah, let's go see what a squat is like.
38:02Hello.
38:06Hey there.
38:06Nick Holden Hi, I'm Mark.
38:08Cammy. Nice to meet you.
38:08Nick Holden Hello, Cammy.
38:10Nick Holden Okay, so this is a squat.
38:11This is a squat.
38:12Nick Holden I gotta admit, it looks a lot nicer than I expected.
38:15I think I thought there'd be boarded up windows and graffiti.
38:18Is it bad that I was expecting a shithole?
38:20Nick Holden Uh, I think that's kind of common.
38:22I think that's what's expected. I think that's a misconception.
38:25Nick Holden This looks like quite a nice bathroom.
38:27Nick Holden It's nicer than some of the places
38:29I've rented, to be honest.
38:30Nick Holden Oh, really? And you live with other people?
38:32Nick Holden Yes, I live with other people.
38:34Nick Holden Okay, let's go meet them.
38:35Nick Holden Let's go.
38:35Nick Holden I didn't realise squatting would actually involve squatting.
38:39Nick Holden Do you have any sense of how many
38:42vacant properties there might be in, well, let's take Melbourne as an example?
38:46Nick Holden A lot.
38:47Nick Holden I think it's 97,000 in the greater Melbourne area.
38:51Nick Holden Gosh.
38:52Nick Holden I mean, 97,000
38:55homes empty and recent estimates are something that there's 30,000 people living rough and a lot more
39:03that are housing insecure. So it breaks my heart.
39:06Nick Holden So this is a really obvious question,
39:08Nick Holden But I have to ask it. What would you say to those people who say,
39:12Nick Holden You're living illegally in someone else's property?
39:15Nick Holden Shelter is a human right. That's just how it is.
39:19Nick Holden I just can't re-engage in the housing market the way that it is right now.
39:22Nick Holden I'm a qualified social worker.
39:24Nick Holden I work. It's not necessarily that I can't afford to rent.
39:28Nick Holden It's that I've attended rental viewings,
39:32Nick Holden And there's 60 other people there trying to fight and compete for these overpriced
39:37Nick Holden I just thought maybe I'll have a crack at making use of these empty homes instead.
39:44Nick Holden It just makes no sense to have so many homes empty
39:48Nick Holden And then to be fighting each other for scraps.
39:51Nick Holden Squatting might be pretty frowned upon.
39:56Nick Holden That's probably got something to do with the whole
39:58Nick Holden Moving in for free without permission thing. I get it.
40:02Nick Holden But with so many empty buildings like that,
40:04Nick Holden Maybe there are other ways of turning them into places to live.
40:08Nick Holden One group is trying to do this.
40:11Nick Holden Housing All Australians is a collection of developers who are combining their skills
40:15Nick Holden And working free of charge to fix up dilapidated properties.
40:20Nick Holden Developers working for good? This I've got to see.
40:24Nick Holden Do you think there are enough empty properties that could actually then
40:27Nick Holden Make a dent in the housing crisis?
40:28Nick Holden There is, for sure.
40:29Nick Holden You know, if someone can find those empty properties, and I'm sure there's
40:33Nick Holden A number of them that are empty, if you can find those and align yourself with
40:37Nick Holden Builders that really want the best for the community, then definitely.
40:40Nick Holden I mean, there's always going to be that crisis.
40:42Nick Holden But if you can find any way to reduce it, that's aligning yourself with good people.
40:45Nick Holden Luke's company is normally in the business of constructing new homes.
40:50Nick Holden But here they've refurbished a disused building that's about to be
40:53Nick Holden Tenanted with families needing short-term accommodation, and they did it in just four weeks.
41:00Nick Holden With all the free labour involved, I couldn't help being a little suspicious,
41:04so I did my due diligence and checked out the handiwork.
41:13Nick Holden It works.
41:13Nick Holden But what do these refurbished projects look like when people actually move in?
41:26Nick Holden I'm going to visit the tenants living in a previously empty building in Port Melbourne,
41:30where Housing All Australians has worked in partnership with a social housing provider.
41:35Nick Holden And while building new social housing takes time, this has been done at speed.
41:40Nick Holden Oh, hello.
41:42Nick Holden G'day. Hi, I'm Mark.
41:44Nick Holden I'm Brian. How are you?
41:46Nick Holden Hello, Brian.
41:47Nick Holden Thank you for letting me come to your place.
41:49Nick Holden So how do you find it here? What's it like?
41:50Nick Holden It's too good. I've got a nice apartment.
41:53Nick Holden I have my son living down the road, and it is a much more easier life.
41:59Nick Holden No housemates. That's the dream.
42:00Nick Holden No housemates. That's in my particular case.
42:03Nick Holden So how long have you been here?
42:05Nick Holden A year and four months.
42:07Nick Holden Do you think initiatives like this are really important?
42:10Nick Holden Yeah, I think it's very important that they can
42:13develop undeveloped areas which are lying vacant. So someone took the initiative and I appreciate
42:20the stability and there's no homeowner here who can up the price 20% or whatever it feels like. And
42:27it's also not going to close down. This house will offer me the stability which I need as an older person.
42:36Nick Holden Rents here are set at 25% of a person's income.
42:42Nick Holden What's it like living here?
42:45Nick Holden You've got a place which you can get up and
42:49have a shower and make some breakfast without anybody complaining about it. Where you can keep your
42:56belongings and not have to worry about them getting stolen off the streets, especially if you've been there.
43:02Nick Holden What does that do for your sense of self and mental health, knowing you've got a place?
43:08Nick Holden It has made a big difference to my life because I wasn't sure what was going to happen.
43:12Nick Holden This is heaven for me. Heaven. H-E-A-V-E-N.
43:22Nick Holden
43:34Meeting these people reminds me what a difference having a stable roof over your head can make in
43:39people's lives. I think this basic idea is something that gets lost in our current debate
43:47about housing. So, where do we go from here?
43:57Nick Holden I think we saw some really interesting ideas that people are pursuing. I love the idea of
44:013D printed houses. You can see that it saves on time and money and materials. On the renting side
44:06of things, ideas like build to rent, provide greater stability for renters. That's all great.
44:10Nick Holden I've got to be honest. This is not good enough. And that's no disrespect to that work. I'm
44:17talking about the bigger issue we have. It's a mindset issue we have in this country where we are viewing
44:22property as a pathway to wealth as opposed to something which is designed for people to live in.
44:28Nick Holden At what point did the Australian dream go from owning your own home to owning somebody else's?
44:34Nick Holden It's ridiculous. I don't have this great silver bullet solution for this problem other
44:41than everyone needs to understand that this is unsustainable and that this is wrong. It's actually morally
44:47wrong what we're doing. So get angry about it because I bloody well am.
44:57We may not have a silver bullet, but maybe we just need the silver foxes.
45:02Nick Holden I realized that without getting the homeowners, the boomers, the investors on board,
45:07we won't be able to change the Australian mindset. We just need to convince them that they would also
45:13benefit from the change. And there was only one man for that job.
45:17Nick Holden Ray, look I'm sorry I couldn't take your calls. I was too busy being an Australian icon.
45:35Nick Holden I understand. Ray, you're the only one that can help me. Australia's housing crisis will
45:40never be solved as long as homes are treated as an investment strategy instead of as places for people
45:45to live. People need to understand that the great Australian dream is no longer alive and well,
45:49as you once said, funnily enough on a building site just like this one.
45:53Nick Holden At this twilight end of our century,
45:54the great Aussie dream is still alive and well.
45:57Nick Holden Ray?
45:58Nick Holden Ray What's changed, Mark?
46:00Nick Holden Well, I've just been covering that for the last hour.
46:02You'll need to rewind it.
46:04Nick Holden I don't think that's going to happen. Um, is there anything I can do to help?
46:07Nick Holden Well, I want to record a message to end this film on housing that reflects the current
46:11reality. And we need you. Older Australians will listen to you, Ray. Can you do that?
46:24Nick Holden Yeah, okay.
46:29Nick Holden At the twilight end of the 20th century,
46:32the great Aussie dream was alive and well. Little did we understand that at that very time,
46:37changes were taking place, which would supercharge the cost of housing in the lucky country.
46:42Nick Holden As a nation, we became
46:44addicted to increasing the value of our homes. But now we have to ask a question of the homeowners
46:49out there. Just what is the value of your home if your kids and grandkids now can't afford to live
46:54in the same town as you? Nick Holden Or worse yet, the only way that they can
46:57afford to live nearby in your street is by moving in with you and drinking all of your BBs and eating
47:03all of your gherkins, even though they don't like BBs or gherkins.
47:06Nick Holden Okay, we've shown the need for greater
47:09investment in public housing, new approaches to building, using the empty properties we already
47:14have and tackling our tax system. Just as crucially, we've seen the need to improve the whole experience
47:19of renting and provide stability of housing. The tragic reality is not everyone is going to be able to
47:25own a home. Nick Holden Well, as you've seen, I haven't seen, but there's no one silver bullet for the problem.
47:30Nick Holden Just once, I'd like someone to say there is a silver bullet.
47:33Nick Holden Well, the solution can't be, let's just keep
47:35doing what we've been doing, because the Australian dream as we once knew it might be over. But it
47:40doesn't mean that we have to accept the nightmare. Nick Holden That was great, Ray. You really love
47:45those BBs. Nick Holden The old food of champions. Was that enough? Did that do it?
47:49Nick Holden That was perfect, Ray. Nick Holden Okay.
47:51Nick Holden Just one more thing. You couldn't lend me some money for a house, could you?
47:55Nick Holden Let me think about it.
48:03Nick Holden
48:08Nick Holden
48:11Nick Holden
48:13Nick Holden
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