Where Victorian landlords own property: search your suburb

Two Melbourne suburbs have been revealed as Australia’s landlord hot spots, and they’re not the only Victorian areas where large numbers of property investors call home. SEARCH YOUR SUBURB

Nathan Mawby

@mrmawby

4 min read

July 22, 2023 - 5:00AM

News Corp Australia Network

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Werribee and Point Cook are Australia’s landlord capital and they’re not the only Victorian battler suburbs that large numbers of property investors call home.

Australian Taxation Office figures released last month show postcode 3030, dominated by Werribee and Point Cook, is home to 11,224 property investors — more than any other in the nation.

And with Victoria home to 560,623 landlords, more than a quarter of the national total, four more of our postcodes made the Australian top 10.

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The area around Glen Waverley was third, Hoppers Crossing and Tarneit came in fifth, while Cranbourne just scraped in at ninth.

With areas including Craigieburn, Caroline Springs and Hillside also in the state’s 10 most prolific postcodes for landlords, the tax figures from the 2020-2021 financial year indicate landlords are more likely to live in a battler ‘burb than the posh streets of Toorak — where there were 1792 people who declared rental income.

Real Estate Institute of Victoria chief executive Quentin Kilian said the tax stats showed the state’s average landlord wasn’t “filthy rich”.

“These are working class suburbs,” Mr Kilian said.

“It’s not all surgeons and CEOs. The bulk of landlords are mum-and-dad investors who have one property for their future, but who have stretched as far as they can.”

CEO of Real Estate Institute of Victoria Quentin Kilian.

The Werribee and Point Cook area were also among the nation’s most negatively geared, with 7152 of them recording a net loss on their investment in the tax data.

Statewide, more than 279,000 landlords, just under 50 per cent, were negatively geared.

Mr Kilian said those who were would now be struggling with higher land tax bills and interest rate costs.

He added that many of those who were positively geared would be retired and did not earn an income that would allow them to negatively gear a property if costs kept rising.

He said thousands of landlords from both camps were currently considering selling up and there was risk there would be “multitudes” of families living in cars in the near future.

Jian Cheng is a landlord who told the Herald Sun last week she's fed up with the huge land tax she has to pay on her property in Victoria that she's moving her family to Queensland. Picture: Mark Stewart

HockingStuart Werribee’s Samantha McCarthy said the area’s landlords often didn’t even tell family and friends they owned an investment property, and were typically not in high-flying careers.

“They are mum and dads, not your high business income earners,” Ms McCarthy said.

“It’s local families who have thought if we rent it out, in 10 years our kids could move out to it.”

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With the region recording significant price growth in 2017-2018 and again in more recent years, Ms McCarthy said many of the suburb’s landlords would have been families who’s own home had risen in value and who had used the equity to reinvest in their suburb.

However, while investors had been prevalent in the area in the past, they had been much less common in the past 12-18 months since interest rate hikes began.

Landlord buys so kids don’t miss out

Jeff Nuttall is a landlord living in Werribee. Picture: Mark Stewart

Werribee local turned landlord Jeff Nuttall decided to invest in property to help his son stay in the area he believed has “so much potential”.

The co-founder of totalflow Business Software, has lived in Werribee for 34 years, but decided to help out when his son spotted a “good opportunity” that was out of his price range while home hunting.

The 1034sq m property located six minutes from the train station is on one title, but has three properties on it.

“There was already a tenant in one of them, who’s still there, she’s been there many years,” he said.

“Now my son is renting the middle one and we are renovating the third one at the moment, probably looking at Airbnb.”

Real Estate Buyers Agents Association of Australia president Cate Bakos said many of the battler ‘burbs with high numbers of landlords were also attracting large numbers of skilled migrants who were often able to command high salaries.

“And they might be embracing the opportunity that Australian property presents,” Ms Bakos said.

She added that with most investors historically seeking out homes in their own neighbourhood, it was also possible the lower mortgage costs for the family home in these areas would provide more scope for investing in property than was available to those grappling with multimillion-dollar property prices in well-heeled suburbs.

Buyer's agent and president of the Real Estate Buyers Agents Association of Australia Cate Bakos.

However she said she feared Victorian investors would soon shift their attention interstate.

“The prevalence of buying interstate has changed,” Ms Bakos said.

“Covid has made it a lot more common.”

And new figures from virtual real estate inspection group Little Hinges could hint her concerns are coming true, with Victorians now accounting for a quarter of interstate investors and homebuyers remotely inspecting homes across Brisbane, the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast.

Little Hinges chief executive Mike York said the numbers of Victorians looking out of their own state had been trending up across the past year.

“But Victoria has the lowest number of people looking back into it,” Mr York said.