The number of people signing a petition for tighter rules on foreign ownership of Australian property has hit 26,000.
The boost to the number of signatories to the petition – there’s been a jump of 20,000 in a month – comes as the boss of a prominent Chinese property website predicted foreign investors’ passion for Australian real estate was escalating.
“We predict Chinese property investment will increase in Australia by 15 to 20 per cent over the next 12 months,” Simon Henry, the co-CEO of Juwai.com told Domain in a video interview.
Mr Henry refers to a NAB survey that showed investment in NSW was dropping but increasing in Brisbane and Melbourne. He put this down to better marketing of their states and universities.
Mr Henry also discounted a common criticism of foreign investment – that overseas buyers were pushing up property prices and making it more difficult for first home buyers.
“The average price of a property a Chinese person is buying in Australia is around US$1.36 million,” he said. Far beyond the budgets of first home buyers.
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