Australia 2026: The Housing Crisis No Budget Can Fix

George Markoski Hello and welcome to the Positive Property Show. I’m your host George Markoski and tonight we’re going to be talking about the housing crisis no budget can fix. Once again the government is attacking the middle class and investors and trying to fix the housing crisis the way they know how to do it. I’m going to break down the budget because every year, as you know, I break down the budget and bring it down to earth so everyone understands what they’re talking about. So everyone understands what’s happening. And I’ve been behind the scenes working hard, crunching the numbers and doing everything I need to so I can bring you the latest information. Now I’ve got some good news and bad news, but if you’re an investor of us, it’s probably more good news, which is great. But let’s get started. George Markoski Hey, the government just changed the rules again and most Australians are going to panic. But smart investors will adapt. So what’s really happening in Australia and who’s paying for it? Every home just got $80,000 more expensive. War adds 4% to build costs in baseline, but worst case scenario, up to 12%. So that means if you’re building a $670,000 house, it’s actually going to cost $80,000 more to build in the next 12 months than what it is now. And that’s because diesel, freight and petrochemicals are surcharging. And basically as I said, CBA, they expect output price to peak at around 8% but it could be higher in the third quarter of 2026. So what happens is the slow moving petrochemical disaster on the Strait of Hormuz is slowly gaining weight on us. George Markoski And what happens is as it moves forward different supply chains get stressed and prices go up and they cause inflation and that’s what’s happening. So $80,000 more, what does that mean? I’ll tell you what it really means. If you can buy a property at today’s build price and you don’t get charged that extra $80,000, you basically locked in $80,000 equity in the house because it’s going to cost $80,000 more to build. That’s what it means. At that 12% mark, that may not hit 12%. CBA thinks it’s going to hit 8%. But if it does, that’s what it is. So let’s go under the budget. So with the headline deficit of $237 billion right, versus the underlying $143 billion over four years. See, this is the thing. Albanese has been a little bit sneaky and he’s been hiding $94 billion off the books. Right. So basically… Christina Markoski How does someone hide $94 billion? George Markoski Yes. Well, what they do is they hide through special funds and equity injections. Right. Now the Albanese government is the most aggressive off budget government in our history. But what they do is they categorise certain spending as special funds and equity injections. So therefore they don’t have to actually add it to the profit and loss of the country. Christina Markoski Wow. George Markoski Now guess what? This is going to make the RBA’s inflation fight harder than necessary. But not only that, it’s going to be your kids and grandchildren that are paying this back. We’ve nearly hit $1 trillion in debt. Let that sink in. $1 trillion. I sound like Austin Powers, you know, Dr. Evil. $1 trillion more. Christina Markoski Except it’s a trillion. Yeah, it’s about Australia’s debt. George Markoski I want to hit the tax angle because this is important. Now where does Canberra get its money? This is the sad truth. Half of federal revenue comes from your wages. Can you believe that? So more than 50% of every Canberra dollar comes from PAYG tax income. Christina Markoski I believe it. George Markoski Not gas, not oil, not the multinationals making record profits. It comes from workers, tradies and small business owners. Right. They tax wages because wages can’t move. Offshore labor talks about fairness, but the data tells a very different story. Look at this. Personal income tax, 52%, more than 50%. That’s just ludicrous. It’s ridiculous. If you want to talk about tax and how crap what the fork is going on with the Australian government. That’s what I can say, right? Look at this top tax threshold. So what that means is when you earn a certain amount of money, when you hit your top tax bracket. So in Australia, when you hit 1.9 times the median wage, you hit the top bracket. But look at this. In Germany it’s 3 times, New Zealand 3.5, in USA it’s 8 times. So what does that mean? George Markoski If the median wage is $100,000 in the US, that means you have to earn $800,000 before you get taxed the top rate. But in Australia it’s less than $200,000. Right. So the wealthiest workers don’t even hit the top bracket until eight times. Australia is the worst in the English speaking world right now. This is the other thing. Bracket creep drags more workers in every year. And what does bracket creep mean? Well, as wages go up, you hit that higher level even when you’re not earning more than the average person. Christina Markoski And then you’re paying more tax. George Markoski All of a sudden what happens is the tax threshold is a certain amount and each year as you go up, more people are going up and hitting that revenue hit and creeping through. It is ridiculous. And what did the budget do to fix this? Nada. Zero. Right? So this is what your Labor promised. They promised to help young Aussies. Watch what they actually did. They grandfathered every existing landlord. No change for people who already owned properties, quarantined losses from first time investors, penalised the next generation, added 55,000 more migrants in the same budget. So demand keeps climbing. They won’t tax gas and oil giants making $40 billion in super profits. The lobbyists win, then they come after pay wages instead. The easiest target. This is the biggest two speed system in Australian history. And what they did is they sold it as fairness. George Markoski Labor keeps talking about helping the young generation, but they’re actually hindering and doing the opposite. What they’re doing is what’s helped past generations to invest in property and move ahead. They’re trying to cut that off from the new generation and saying, oh, we’re going to help them get property. So look at this. $40 billion in super profits, zero new tax. Norway’s effective tax rate on their gas is 78%. They’ve got a sovereign wealth fund worth $1.6 trillion. Australia’s effective gas tax rate is 5%. Christina Markoski That’s it. George Markoski And our sovereign wealth fund is nothing. We don’t have one. Not only that, we’re $1 trillion in debt. So they’re too scared to touch migration, too scared to touch gas. So they’re coming for you instead. 300,000 new arrivals this year, less than 1% vacancy rate and a 50% rise in rent since 2019. The cause is obvious. The fix is obvious, right? If you want to reduce the price of property, if you want to slow down the property market, you need to cut migration. But Labor won’t name it. They’re blaming property investors instead. Yep. And in the same budget, Labor added 55,000 more to the housing queue. So 35,000 for 2025/26 and 20,000 for 2026/27. Now forecast at 300,000. Migrants are leaving at lower rates than expected. Of course they love Australia. Why would you leave? And every extra arrival deepens an already savage shortage. George Markoski So there’s the deal. You can’t fix housing while stacking the queue and creating more demand. 50% rent rise since 2019. Welcome to Labor’s housing plan. That’s $12,000 a year added per household in rent, now four years under 1% and no plan to fix it. A healthy vacancy is 3%. Right. But our vacancy rates remain below 1%, meaning rental supply is effectively gone. And now a lot of rental properties were being sold on the market because people were scared of what’s happening. The CBA actually forecasts even slower construction due to the oil shock. The high migration remains the main driver. The RBA can’t fix this. The treasurer can’t fix it. Only supply can. Labor promised 1.2 million homes, but they’re going to deliver 885,000. Right. So CBA’s baseline forecast falls to 885,000 homes, 26% below target. And that’s if we hit that. George Markoski With all the construction companies going broke. NHSAC forecast failed to account for the oil shock. Higher RBA rates are stalling construction even more. These are their numbers, not the opposition. Christina Markoski I’ll be surprised if they get anywhere. George Markoski Near that every single year. We’re 40,000 homes short every year. Even with migration cuts, the deficit actually compounds. So this is like the most extreme lack of property we’ve had in Australia’s history. Christina Markoski That’s getting worse every year. George Markoski Every year by 40,000. That’s a lot of people. Think about 40,000. That means there’s 120,000 people because you average about three people per dwelling. That’s 120,000 people that don’t have somewhere to live every year. And the budget locked the door on young investors. Thank you, budget. They should be looking after the young investors. Right. The existing owners get to keep the old 50% CGT discount through the 1st of July. The new investors face a 30% minimum tax on gains from 1st of July 2027. I’m going to break this down later. Explain what it means for all our investors here as well. Now Australia’s new CGT regime is the highest in the English speaking world. So you look at this. The minimum CGT in Australia is 30%. Used to be 22%. New Zealand’s 15%, UK is 20%. George Markoski Canada, US 20%. The highest tax in the world. Are we surprised we pay more for everything here? This isn’t reform, it’s intergenerational theft disguised as fairness. The exact people they’re saying they’re helping, they’re hindering. So if you’re already in, you’re protected. If you’re not, the door just slammed shut. Literally. If you signed the contract before 12 May at 7pm on a property, many investors that signed the contract then would actually be $47,000 ahead right now as we speak. Isn’t that amazing? Christina Markoski Talk about timing. George Markoski Yes. Imagine you sign that contract one day late and you miss $47,000. Christina Markoski It can happen. George Markoski $47,000 per property. What it means for investors, the rule change smart investors adopt. Okay, what does it really mean? Look at this. Melbourne is the cheapest it’s been since 1980 relative to wages. Right. Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide have surged 80 to 100% since 2021. Melbourne prices rose 5.8% while wages climbed 19.8%. Victoria’s land tax is brutal, but the value opportunity is undeniable. Right. So supply constrained markets always continue to outperform long term. So one thing about Melbourne, it’s cheap. It’s the best value it’s ever been for a long time. Used to be overpriced and that’s why it didn’t grow. But now you think about this. Imagine if you had a time machine and got to buy in Melbourne back in 1980. How cool would that be? Well, we’ve got a time machine right now. George Markoski It’s like 1980. So there’s certain suburbs in Melbourne that are going to do very well. Okay, these dates change everything. Okay? 12th of May 2026, 7:30pm Eastern Standard Time, the grandfathering cutoff. If you owned or signed before this moment, you’re protected. After 7:30pm 12th of May 2026, the grandfathering is finished. So from 1st of July, the new negative gearing and CGT rules begin. And then we’ve got one year of easing into it. And then after 1st of July 2028, the 30% minimum tax starts for discretionary trusts. That’s the three dates you need to put in place. Remember I was telling people before 12th of May you should sign a contract and do it beforehand. That’s why. So if you already own an investment property, you’re fully grandfathered. No change, works exactly as it always has. You don’t have to worry. George Markoski So well done for everyone who’s already got one because a lot of people panicking, you know, people were scared that what they were going to do is just say, I don’t care if you already own one, we’re going to do it right now. Now to 1st of July, the 50% CGT discount is protected on gains. But from now on, if you buy a property, if it’s not brand spanking new, you’re not going to get negative gearing on it at all. And from 1st of July 2027, future gains move under the new CGT rules. So buying an established property now to 1st of July works normally, negative gearing offsets your wages. CGT still applies. Losses can no longer be offset against wages or other personal income from 1st of July. So really it’s only going to last 12 months. So there’s no point. George Markoski So what I’m saying is do not buy a property that’s not brand new ever again because you’re not going to get any discounts and you’re going to pay more CGT. But I’ve got some good news for investors and part of our group. What’s going to happen with you guys, right? If you buy a brand new property, guess what? Nothing’s changed. Still available against wages and other income. No change, no quarantine. This is the really good news out of here, that we can continue on with what we’re doing and keep going. Christina Markoski Well, it’s all about having the right strategy at the end of the day. George Markoski Yes. But I’ll tell you the good news. It’s actually even better now than before. You want me to explain? Christina Markoski Yeah. George Markoski Okay. So what happens is we’ve got the new indexation, which is the new system where you’re paying a minimum of 30% on a property. Right now it’s not that good, but sometimes it’s better. Most times it’s worse. The new capital gains tax. But because we’re buying brand new properties, guess what? This is the amazing thing. When you dispose of your property, you actually can do the numbers up front and choose if you want to pay, get 50% discount, or if you want to do indexation. And this is what I suggest you do. Do the numbers and whatever saves you more money, that’s what you do. Is that amazing? Christina Markoski That’s a pretty cool hack. George Markoski So what they’ve done is they’ve actually given us an opportunity to save even more tax if we do it the right way. Christina Markoski You’ve got the right investment strategy? Yeah, yeah. George Markoski How good? Right. Christina Markoski That’s amazing. So how would we implement this on the program? George Markoski Well, what will happen is when someone’s ready to buy, I’ll give them the framework because I’ve done similar stuff in the past already. So I’ve sold a few properties and I saved a lot of capital gains by getting the numbers right. Because if you don’t know how to do the numbers, you haven’t got an accountant that knows what they’re doing. You can get it wrong very easily. Right. How does indexation work? Indexation works like this. And this is why indexation is not good for our group. So indexation, what happens is you buy a property and then let’s say inflation is 5% a year and then you sell your property in 10 years. What indexation does is you only have to pay if you got more money than that 5%. If you didn’t, you only pay 30%. Does that make sense? Right, right. George Markoski But I’ll tell you why it won’t work for our group and our people. We make a lot more than inflation. I mean think about how much we’ve made. Inflation was like 3% and we’ve had clients making $100,000, $200,000, $300,000. Right. So we’re making a lot more than indexation. So for us, indexation is bad. You know who indexation is good for? Indexation is really good for investors that haven’t done well. Christina Markoski Right? George Markoski They’re good because you know, some people that buy a property and it does really badly, they hold it for 15 years. And I’ve seen this happen many times and before they join our program, they’ve had a property, they’ve had it for 10 years, it made $100,000 in 10 years. And really when you look at the inflation, it did worse than inflation. Christina Markoski Yeah. What if we’re not selling? It doesn’t matter then. George Markoski No, no, but what I’m saying, you want the option of selling and having the option of selling. Now we’ve got two options instead of one. It’s actually better for us, right? Literally better. Let’s keep going. So new build investors just got an upgrade. Old rules, negative gearing on new builds, 50% CGT discount on long held gains. One CGT method, no choice. After 12th of May, guess what we get? Negative gearing on new builds, we get 50% discount or indexation method. Pick whatever is going to pay less tax. So what they’re doing now is they’re actually going to be rewarding sophisticated investors and our group of people, our investors, literally, which I’m very surprised. Same property, same profit. The only difference is what you pay. So look at this. George Markoski If you buy a $750,000 purchase and do a $1.4 million exit, a 10 year hold at the top tax bracket, if you bought established, you’re going to end up with $455,000 profit. But if you get a new build, you’re going to end up with $615,000 instead because you got the discount. So if you buy an established property, you just gave up $160,000 per property. So the deal is, remember back in the day before, what’s happened when you compare used and new because obviously we like to buy new because of the negative gearing and you get $80,000. Well now on top of that you’re going to get $160,000 on top of the $80,000 instead. George Markoski So when you compare a $750,000 property that’s new and you compare it to a used one which is one day old, there’s literally, what’s $160,000 plus $80,000, $240,000 difference in those two properties. Christina Markoski Wow, that’s huge. George Markoski That’s a humongous difference. Like wow. Now a lot of people are not going to understand this and they’re going to buy the wrong property and miss out on $240,000 per property. So the government isn’t banning property investing, they’re just pushing you towards new and smart investors. Don’t panic. They adapt and they get in before the 30th of June 2027. That’s what they do. That’s the bottom line. Now before we go to our private group, I want to do a case study first. Real people, real results. Have a look at this. This is the Lang family, Stephen, Nikki and kids Jesse and Brianna. Okay, the first investment property, Raceview, Queensland. Three bedroom, two bathroom, two car. They bought this for $485,000. Then details of property, 10% deposit, $48,000, settled in March 2023 for $485,000. Now it’s worth $720,000. Current profit $235,000. George Markoski This one’s in Pinjara, WA. This is a three bedroom, two bathroom, two car. They paid $469,990. Look at this house, it’s beautiful. So used owner occupier equity, settled in December 2024 for $469,990. The market value now is $711,000. The current profit is $241,000. Now remember I was talking about indexation? When you make $240,000 on a property in one year, with indexation, you’re not going to make that much at all. You’re making so much more than the actual inflation. If you look at properties around Australia, on average they average the same as inflation. Right? But if you buy the top 100, you’re doing so much better, you’re doing 10 times the return. Okay, the next one. Burdell. Four bedroom, two bathroom, two car. Beautiful property. Nice car. I think it’s got a Porsche in front of it, but maybe. $586,000. Christina Markoski That’s how they roll in Burdell. George Markoski That’s it. I know. They don’t muck around. There’s another property. They paid $58,000 deposit, settled in January 2025 for $586,000. Market value $678,000 now. Current profit, $92,000. Oh, no, they only made $92,000. Okay. Morayfield, three bedroom, two bathroom, one car. $555,000. This has got just a normal car, no Porsche. So they paid 10% deposit, settled in June 2025, $555,000. Market value $737,000. Current profit, $182,000. Christina Markoski Nice. George Markoski Oh, wow. Another one. Virginia. $778,500. Four bedroom, two bathroom, one car. Used equity, settled in September 2025, $778,000. Market value $815,000. Made $36,500. Burpengary. $789,000. Three bedroom, two bathroom, two car. What happened was their children, Jesse and Brianna, came as legacy clients. So instead of giving their children a fish, they taught them how to fish. They joined the program. They got their first property in April 2026. They paid $789,000, $78,900 in deposit. The total current profit in three years, $786,000. Wow. Christina Markoski Okay, that’s $262,000 a year. George Markoski That’s better than the average wage in Australia. Put it that way. Christina Markoski It’s a lot of money. George Markoski I’ve just lost my camera. Christina Markoski I have six properties. George Markoski Let’s go. Let’s have a chat. Hello, Stephen and Nikki. How are you? Stephen Lang Yeah, first. Thank you, George. It’s been pretty straightforward, easy. So, yep, we kind of had half an idea of what property could do for us, but started back again a few years ago having a look at what options there were. George Markoski And yeah, I can see a guitar in the background. Who’s the musician in your family? Stephen Lang It’s a cutout. George Markoski Oh, it’s a cutout. Okay, there you go. All right. I’m like, wow. He’s like, I thought you’re going to do a little solo for us, right? Stephen Lang I had to go for a bit of a dress up for a company, so I went as Slash. George Markoski Oh, you went as Slash. Stephen Lang Nice event. Yeah. George Markoski Awesome. Stephen Lang Awesome. George Markoski Stephen, Nikki, I just want to say well done. Nikki Lang Thank you. George Markoski You’ve gone in and you have just smashed it. That’s a lot of properties in three years. Nikki Lang That Pinjara property, it took a year to construct. Yeah. And in that year, the values just went up so much that it just allowed for that next property. Just, yeah… George Markoski That’s what I want to talk about. What I want to do is I want to start your journey. How did your journey start? How did you find us? Why did you decide to invest in property? Stephen Lang I think like I said, not good at shares. You know, just never had family or anyone do anything in shares. But we knew a bit about property and bought and sold a few over the years. And then it was just a few years ago, said, all right, just knuckle down. Not getting any younger, got to do something and stop spending money on crap. So, yeah, once you start looking for one company, like you see a million of them pop up on Facebook and Instagram, and yeah, I think just somehow you guys convinced me with your credibility and your sales pitch. To be honest. George Markoski Yeah. Stephen Lang All right. Okay. Someone’s got to go with something, you know, and it was the old different things. But yeah, just like what you said and leap of faith, went in with one, wasn’t really convinced with Raceview and the apartments and townhouses on that lot. So put the pressure on Charmaine to say, hey, can you find us traditional house and land? So that’s where Pinjara came at the same time. So we had one in self managed super, one in our own names at the same time. So it was manageable. Yeah, yeah. So just ended up with, as it is, three in self managed super and two in our own name. George Markoski Look, six properties under your belt. That’s a very rare breed, because most investors stop at one or two and it’s like 0.1% of Australians that actually get to five or more investments. So it’s very rare. So you’ve actually got a very decent portfolio. So that’s amazing. How did you have the courage to keep going and do it so fast? Stephen Lang You guys make it relatively easy. From a finance point of view, knowing what we’re right for, knowing what we need to do. Gabe’s advice, you know, Stephen, you don’t need a novated lease for another car. Just showed us the numbers and what that does to your borrowing capacity. So there’s good education there that. Hey, so now I’m driving a car that’s probably coming up eight years old. George Markoski Yeah. Stephen Lang Pretty rare for me to have a car that long, but, you know, it does the job. Just looking at our finances a bit more, what do we want to achieve? And I’m one of those people that doesn’t like working, so I don’t want to work forever. George Markoski Oh, there you go. Yep. Stephen Lang So if I don’t do something now, I don’t want to live on the pension. Just. It’s not going to happen. George Markoski Well, you’re well on your way to retirement. What’s your goal? How many properties is your goal? Stephen Lang I think I said to you, I think I said two a year. Yeah, yeah. I think that’s going to be possible. But hey, if it’s one a year, that’s what I’ll take. George Markoski Once you get to a certain amount of properties, I mean, five properties in 10 years is going to give you, probably that’s $125,000 a year’s income just from the rent, not including the equity going up. And 10 properties, $250,000. So there you go. But that’s just the old numbers, the new numbers will probably be more like $160,000 to $180,000 for five and probably like $300,000 for 10. Good. Stephen Lang And the last one’s obviously not ours, it’s for the kids because, you know, the. George Markoski Yeah. Stephen Lang Somehow they had decent savings. So we said, do you want to go 50? And look, that’s. George Markoski I really like what you’re doing and getting your kids in the legacy program and getting them involved in property because now look what the government’s doing, it’s making it harder and harder for young people to invest. And if you don’t help them now, the future is going to be very difficult. So what you’ve done is amazing. And when you’re young, the compounding effect happens a lot more because as long as you keep it, it just keeps going up and up. Nikki Lang The prices have just gone up so much in the last three years as well. You know, the first two properties we bought were in the $400,000 mark. Now you can barely get anything under $800,000. That’s the same. Yeah, got lucky there. George Markoski Yeah, no, you got lucky. And look, with supply constrained at the moment, they’re going to keep going up. Got no choice. Christina Markoski Yeah. George Markoski That’s the fact of it. So, yeah. Okay. What would you say to people? Stephen Lang Just quickly, quick shout out to Charmaine before we forget. George Markoski Yes, please. Stephen Lang It’s been great. And Billy. Nikki Lang Oh, yeah. Amazing. George Markoski Yep. Because Charmaine’s been your coach and Billy is obviously, she makes sure everything happens with settlements. Christina Markoski Yes. Stephen Lang Yeah. George Markoski Because she’s got one of the most stressful jobs because she’s got to coordinate finance, the developer, you, the one stop shop, everyone. Right. And having someone like Billy really reduces the stress. People don’t understand how stressful buying a house can be if you don’t have the right team around you. And luckily you’ve got the right team around you, which makes it a lot less stressful because you’re like, yeah, it’s easy, but it’s hard. It’s not easy. Getting the mechanics right is hard, but also the mindset. Obviously you got the mindset down pat. Stephen Lang Yeah, yeah, yep. Know what your borrowing capacity is and put your hand up when you’re ready. George Markoski Yeah. What would you say to people that are looking at our company, looking at our program? What would you say to them? Stephen Lang It’s working for us. So all I can say is compare it to someone else I know who went through a buyer’s agent and said he bought a place in Tassie, and I can’t remember how much it was. And I said, what’d you pay the buyer’s agent? He said, $40,000. So that’s for one off transaction. So just in my mind, I said, geez, okay, you paid a lot for that property. George Markoski Yeah, yeah. Stephen Lang Without saying, you know, because everyone’s probably doing something different. But yeah. Nikki Lang And does he have that team around him? The finance guy, the conveyancer, the Billy? Yeah, that’s right. George Markoski Yeah. And you look at what’s gone up, it’s been Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane. It’s gone up in the last five years. Not Tasmania. Right. Stephen Lang No, no. Even if that was the right area, the right property, etc. George Markoski Yeah. Stephen Lang He’s just paid a lot of money for one property. Compared to what we’ve done. So, yeah, the cost per property is much cheaper compared to what we’ve encountered with you guys. So, yeah, awesome. Happy. Excellent. George Markoski I appreciate you. Thank you. And happy investing. Nikki Lang Thank you. Stephen Lang Thank you. George Markoski Okay, I’m talking to the people on Facebook, people in our podcast. This is the deal. If you want to invest in the right way and you’ve been looking at investing, what I want you to do is comment in because 3,500 Aussies are already doing it with us. And these are real properties and real people. Now we’re going to go to our private group. Thank you for watching. We’re going to go in and do our Q and A. Thank you.