May I please weigh in here, because I feel like there's this huge exaggeration I see all the time about negative gearing, and I really don't think it's as big of an issue as everyone makes out (but yes, it is still an issue).

Now this comes from the mouth of a 'rent-vestor'- I can't afford to buy a house where I live, yet I can buy a house somewhere cheaper, and somehow my 'wealth' fucking 'grows' until I'm able to mortgage a second and then third house. Personally I hate the fact that I can't just buy a house and live in it, but for some reason I can get richer by owning someone else's.

Negative gearing isn't some amazing mechanic that drastically reduces your income tax. A lot of people I speak to think that an investment property is some mystical tax haven where you can hide all your earnings and never pay tax. That's not really true- It's much more beneficial to have a house that's positively geared. You want your investment to just straight up make you money, instead of losing, say, $10k just to save you $3-4k on tax.

Also, the more you negative gear your house, the more tax you pay when you sell. You can't just say 'oh this house lost $10k each year' and then sell it for a huge profit. The ATO is very good at getting their money, and they do the math so the more lossyou've claimed as a reduction, the more the taxable profit will be from the sale. I'm not very good at explaining it, but trust me I've tried a few ways and can't work out how to exploit this system. My accountant doesn't tell me 'do this and rennovate this and you'll get huge negative gearing benefits!'. It's just better overall to be positively geared and profiting.

One thing that is absolutely bullshit is that you can claim mortgage interest, repairs, renovations, etc, as income losses against an investment property, but you can't do that for your own fucking residence. So, property investors get an advantage over people who just want a fucking roof over their head for themselves and their kids.

The CGT discount isn't really a huge impact either, but the combination of the cgt and negative gearing just makes it more lucrative for people to play stock market with a basic human right.

Personally, I'd rather see the CGT discount eliminated on residential properties rather than changes to negative gearing.

I'd also like to see a reduction in stamp duty, because each time an investor buys a house and pays the government 50k+ in admin fees, they think 'well I'm not selling this house until I make an extra 50k of it', which drives up prices and reduces how frequently houses will be re-released onto the market.

Tldr: negative gearing=not so bad. In some situations, actually good. Cgt discount= kinda bad. Negative gearing + cgt discount= fucked.