Michael has been once again voted Australia’s leading property investment advisor by the readers of ‘Your Investment Property Magazine’, but he’s not a theorist… He has been successfully investing in property since 1971 and is a leading property commentator and Australia’s most widely read property investment blogger. Join over 115,000 others who get their updates from Michael and his group of expert guest bloggers and benefit from their perspective.
It seems like property investors have become the punching bag of choice lately. The media loves to portray us as greedy landlords, politicians use us as scapegoats for the housing crisis, and some believe we’re locking first-home buyers out of the market. In fact, in the five decades I’ve been involved in property, I’ve never…
Let’s be honest—playing the lottery feels like harmless fun. A couple of bucks for a shot at financial freedom, right? But here’s the problem: it’s not harmless when people actually believe it’s a strategy to build wealth. It’s not. It never was. In fact, I’d argue that playing the lottery is just a tax on…
Buying property in Australia is tricky enough without the added complexity of state taxes, federal rules, and the ever-changing definitions of who qualifies as a “foreign person.” Recently at Metropole, we worked with a client who held a Resident Return Visa (subclass 155) – a type of permanent visa. Their big questions were: Will I…
Success breeds success, right? It’s true that successful people get that way through a combination of hard work, positivity, and sometimes a little luck. But many successful people – especially the ultra-successful ones – also have powerful beliefs to help guide their journey to the top. The secret is they understand that success is an…
If there’s one thing property investors learn over time, it’s that no two cycles are ever the same. The past decade has reminded us of this lesson again and again. Since 2015, Australia has been through three major interest rate cutting cycles. Each of these has played out very differently, with entirely different market segments…
Each one of the 233 millionaires in my five-year study of rich and poor people was lucky. Fifty-six (24%) were born into it and 177 (76%) created it. The type of luck those 24% received was random good luck. The type of luck those 76% received was self-made. Luck, whether random or self-made, is a common…
![[PODCAST] You Might Stop Working, But Your Money Shouldn’t – Investing Through Retirement with Ken Raiss](https://cdn.propertyupdate.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/689_Retirement_Dreams-KR-Youtube-cover-270x200.jpg)
In today’s show, Ken Raiss and I discuss the evolving landscape of retirement planning, emphasising that retirement is not an end but a new chapter that requires strategic investment and financial planning. We look at what it means to keep your money working in retirement, how property investors should adjust — not stop — their…
Australia’s prestige property markets are revealing a surprising opportunity for strategic buyers – not inside the elite strongholds, but just beyond their borders. Ray White Chief Economist Nerida Conisbee’s latest analysis introduces the concept of “fortress suburbs” – coveted enclaves like Mosman and Toorak that resist the usual spillover effect seen in property markets. These…
Australia’s capital cities have reclaimed the growth lead from the regions for the first time in nine months, with data from the latest Cotality Regional Market Update showing metro values are rising at a faster pace than their regional counterparts. Over the three months to July, the Cotality capital city Home Value Index rose 1.8%,…
In 1966, homeownership in Australia hit “peak home ownership” as 73 per cent of dwellings were owned outright or with a mortgage. That figure has been drifting downward ever since, sitting at 66–67 per cent in recent years, and just 63 per cent at the 2021 Census if you count occupied dwellings only. On the…
