Australia has a problem: we can’t build roads, rail and schools as fast as population is growing with current government financing methods. Failing to keep up with our current needs – let alone investing for an uncertain future - puts the living standards of everyone...
BLOG: Stamp Duty
True Grit: leadership, political backbone and advancing the national interest
The worst tax we pay is a state charge – conveyancing Stamp Duty, which makes it hard, sometimes impossible, to move across town to a better job or around the corner to a bigger or smaller home. Anyone living with modern teenagers and the elderly in a house of many...
Seize the Day, Scott Morrison – rid Australia of a bad tax and free up the land
The land supply equation in Australia - flashing red danger signals for years - has finally come to the attention of federal Treasurer Scott Morrison, who is charged with the task of advancing national prosperity. He may even be prompted into action. Notoriously...
NSW Premier Baird passes the Elixir bottle without taking a swig
NSW Finance Minister Dominic Perrottet floated the idea of exchanging Stamp Duty for State Land Tax in The Australian yesterday. We warmly welcomed his initiative and explained some of the big benefits this offered NSW. By 5.30pm yesterday, Philip Coorey had the...
Will Mike Baird seize the first-mover advantage for NSW – and drink all of the Premiers’ Elixir?
A prize awaits the first state Premier with the political capital and farsightedness to exchange Stamp Duty for State Land Tax. The move would be a magnet for economic activity. As economists repeat ad nauseum, it is all on the margin. Fresh investment – the Premiers’...
The Tax Men from Mars landed in ACT – and were asked to stay
Saturday's Australian Financial Review always needs a nice read and today it is the ACT government's progressive removal of Stamp Duty that increased council rates on a million dollar property from $2200 a few years ago to $3000. What a terrible thing to do! Mather,...
Three unofficial state secrets about the housing problem
by Gavin Putland re-posted from his blog Secret 1: The purpose of encouraging home ownership is to create a majority of voters who own real estate and who therefore support policies that make real estate as expensive as possible, for the benefit of the biggest owners....
Stamp Duty slugs families $91 a month
The Housing Industry Association today released their estimate that conveyancing Stamp Duty costs Australian households $91 a month. “By eroding deposits and making homebuyers borrow more, stamp duty is estimated to add $91 per month to household mortgage repayments...
SMH gets thoroughly modern and calls for a land tax
The Sydney Morning Herald thundered about NSW government finances in a May 25 editorial: $17 b a year hole in NSW future finances. This is mostly the usual stern conservative stuff we have learned to expect from Fairfax. But it does close on an upbeat note: “The...
REINSW: as trustworthy as the agents they represent
The Real Estate Institute of New South Wales calls for conveyancing Stamp Duty discounts for first home buyers and “property consumers over 65 years of age” in its submission to the NSW government‘s June 2016 budget. They say: “The ultimate goal must be to abolish...