Albanese isn’t alone. ‘Stunning’ properties are common for MPs

This story was originally published in February 2024 and has been updated to include Anthony Albanese’s property purchase on the Central Coast.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has admitted his new $4.3 million clifftop home is not like most Australians’ “modest” houses, but he is in much better company among his fellow politicians.

More than 65 per cent of all federal parliamentarians own two or more properties, drawing a stark contrast with the experience of millions of voters who rent as key crossbenchers and Greens push the Albanese government to put negative gearing changes back on the agenda.

Asked about the difference between his Central Coast property and whether the purchase was a “good look” when most Australians struggled to buy a modest home, Albanese said: “As prime minister, I earn a good income. I understand that. I understand I have been fortunate.”

All MPs must declare their property holdings in their register of interests, which is publicly available, and was examined by this masthead in February for this story that represents disclosures available at that date.

In the House of Representatives, where MPs must declare property owned by themselves or their spouses, 103 of 151 federal MPs own two or more properties, and 88 have declared having at least one investment property. Only a few MPs are renters.

In the Senate, where the rules do not require the disclosure of property in a spouse’s name, 47 of the 76 senators own two or more properties, while 30 have declared at least one investment property.

This masthead revealed in September that Treasury was modelling the consequences of potential property changes, including to negative gearing and capital gains tax. Albanese and Treasurer Jim Chalmers both said they were not persuaded by the case for changes to either, but the treasurer did not deny commissioning the modelling work.

The Greens and influential Senate crossbenchers David Pocock and Jacqui Lambie have all previously urged the government to revisit the issue in light of the housing affordability crisis.

Pocock said parliamentarians owned a “stunning amount of property compared to the average Australian” and called for a “sensible debate” about changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax discounts on investment properties.

“It’s hard to believe this doesn’t skew the perspective [of parliamentarians] when considering the suitability of generous tax concessions,” the independent ACT senator said.“I totally understand people wanting to invest in a property for their retirement, but I don’t think taxpayers should subsidise the purchase of a fourth or fifth investment property.”

Pocock owns a home in the ACT and has disclosed another property interstate for which he has lent friends money for their deposit and is on the title. His friends pay the mortgage, and Pocock does not derive income from the property.

Greens housing spokesman Max Chandler-Mather, who does not own property, labelled Anthony Albanese a “property investor prime minister” who was “refusing to phase out billions of dollars in property investor tax concessions that are denying millions of renters the chance to buy a home”.

Greens housing spokesman Max Chandler-Mather.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“I’ve been a renter my entire adult life,” Chandler-Mather said.

“I know what it’s like to be evicted without grounds and cop an unfair rent increase, but it’s something that seems entirely alien to a Labor and Liberal Party stacked full of property investors who all oppose rent caps or changes to negative gearing.”

In the Labor caucus, 77 members of its combined total of 103 MPs and senators, or 75 per cent, have declared ownership of two or more properties in their names or their partners’ names. In the Coalition party room, this figure stands at 55 of its 86 MPs and senators, or 64 per cent.

The Greens have five members with two or more properties. Deputy leader Mehreen Faruqi and the party’s treasury spokesman Nick McKim own four each.

The prime minister is selling his investment property in inner west Sydney’s Dulwich Hill for $1.85 million.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, who has cashed in the sizeable property portfolio he amassed with his wife in recent years, has declared owning just his residential farm in Dayboro, north of Brisbane.

Of those who did not declare a residential home on their interest register, six parliamentarians – less than 3 per cent – confirmed to this masthead that they were renting. However, a number of these MPs and senators also held investment properties at the same time.

Those who were renting and owned no property include: Chandler-Mather and his Greens’ colleague Stephen Bates, and Liberal MP James Stevens. This compares with 30 per cent of Australians who are renters, according to the latest census data, while 35 per cent have a mortgage and 31 per cent own their homes outright.

While Dutton has ruled out supporting any changes to negative gearing, the issue has been on the radar of other Liberals. In comments to a property summit, former NSW Liberal premier Dominic Perrottet called for negative gearing arrangements to be reviewed as part of broader tax reform saying “it could drive supply”.

Many economists, however, have argued that changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions alone would have a minimal impact on housing affordability, and instead boosting the supply of housing stock through less onerous planning laws and government investment was key.

“There are tax policy and equity arguments for changes to the negative gearing and the discount to the capital gains tax. However, it is a non-issue from the point of view of housing affordability,” said Dr Peter Tulip, a former Reserve Bank economist now at the centre-right think tank the Centre for Independent Studies.

Tulip pointed to multiple studies, including one by University of Melbourne academics published in the International Economic Review journal, which found that removing negative gearing would reduce house prices by 0.9 per cent and raise rents 2.5 per cent.

Another study, published in 2016 by the Grattan Institute which has backed policy reform to the concessions as budget-saving measures, found that abolishing negative gearing and halving the capital gains tax discount to 25 per cent would only lower house prices by about 2 per cent.

However, Grattan’s economic policy program director Brendan Coates said while the downward pressure on affordability would be “minuscule”, such changes would boost home ownership rates by making property investment less attractive.

“At the moment, some of those negatively geared investors are beating out first home buyers at auctions. That process changes if those tax concessions are wound back,” he said.

Coates said that the biggest impediment to reform in this area was not politicians being unprepared to act against their personal interests, but fears that they would be punished at the ballot box.

The cost of negative gearing to the budget was $2.7 billion in 2020-21 financial year. Negative gearing is the process whereby taxpayers lose money on investment properties which they then use to reduce their overall taxable incomes.

Labor went to 2016 and 2019 elections promising to restrict negative gearing to new properties only and to halve the 50 per cent capital gains tax deduction, with its tax agenda widely attributed as a key factor in Bill Shorten’s defeat in 2019.

In September, Chalmers defended the use of federal officials to explore property taxation changes, without conceding he had asked them to do so.

“We have made it very clear through the course of this week that we have a broad and ambitious housing policy already and those changes aren’t part of it,” he said.

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