Category
Market Analysis
Melbourne and Australian property market analysis, RBA rate impact, supply/demand cycles, and contrarian takes.
58 articles
- 14 May 202611 min read·Joey Don
Melbourne Has More Flat, Buildable Land Than Any City in Australia. Here's Why That Matters.
Melbourne has more flat buildable land than any Australian city. This geographic fact creates both sprawl and scarcity — and the smartest investors play the scarcity side.
- 23 April 202612 min read·Joey Don
The ATO Is Effectively Lending You Money to Buy Property. Here's the Maths.
The ATO is not your enemy. It is your silent business partner. Here is how high-income earners use negative gearing to build portfolios that the government partially funds.
- 2 April 202611 min read·Joey Don
Everyone Tells You to Buy Brisbane. The State's Balance Sheet Says Otherwise.
I am about to become very unpopular with the Brisbane property influencer crowd. But someone needs to say this, and the numbers do not lie.
- 12 March 202611 min read·Joey Don
Melbourne Is Bouncing. If You Are Still Waiting, You Are Already Late.
Three years. That is how long I waited for this. Melbourne's correction has been brutal, boring, and beautiful for anyone paying attention. The rebound has started, and the affordable suburbs are lead
- 19 February 202611 min read·Joey Don
We Bought 100 Houses in Melbourne Last Year. Every Single One Is Cash-Flow Positive.
While everyone was doom-scrolling about Melbourne's property market, we were buying. Nearly 100 houses in 2024. Average return: 14%. Every single one cash-flow positive after our renovation playbook.
- 29 January 202611 min read·Joey Don
Melbourne's First Half of 2025: The Data That Slapped Every Bear In the Face
If you're still telling people Melbourne property is falling, you haven't looked at the numbers since January. May 2025 alone added 0.8% to house values. That's 9.6% annualised. Let me show you where
- 8 January 202611 min read·Joey Don
Australia Is Structurally a Resource Economy. That's Why Property Is Your Best Bet.
I had coffee with a Chinese tech investor last week. He'd been in Australia for a year and was stunned: 'There's nothing productive to invest in here. Just cafes, bottle shops, and car washes.' He's r
- 18 December 202511 min read·Joey Don
My Uni Mate Bought a $700K Home at 25. It Cost Him $2 Million.
He was the smartest person in my actuarial science cohort. Six-figure salary straight out of uni. He bought a house to live in and it became the most expensive decision of his life — not because it lo
- 27 November 202511 min read·Joey Don
Everyone Says the Economy Is Terrible. Here's Why You Should Buy Property Anyway.
Your mate just got laid off. The cafe down the street closed. The news says recession is coming. And Melbourne house prices posted their strongest quarter in three years. Something doesn't add up — un
- 30 October 202512 min read·Joey Don
Your Bank Account Loses $740 a Year. Here Are Six Assets That Actually Beat Inflation.
The bank tells you 4.5% interest means your money is growing. After tax and inflation, you're losing $740 a year on every $100,000. I ran the numbers on six different asset classes. Only two of them a
- 2 October 202510 min read·Joey Don
My Mate Waited for Rate Cuts. He Got Lower Rates and a $100K Bigger Mortgage.
If you're holding off buying because you expect rates to drop, you need to hear what happened to George. He waited. He got his 2% rate. And he paid $100,000 more for the exact same house.
- 4 September 202511 min read·Joey Don
Perth Property Boomed 89% in 5 Years. That's Exactly Why I Wouldn't Buy There Now.
Perth's numbers look incredible. 89% growth in five years. But a Perth developer with 20 years of experience just told me: don't buy. The cycle data says he's right.
- 7 August 202510 min read·Joey Don
A $700K Melbourne House Actually Costs $756,000. Here Are the 6 Hidden Fees.
My mate nearly had a meltdown the week before settlement. He'd budgeted for the deposit. He hadn't budgeted for the other $56,000.
- 10 July 202512 min read·Joey Don
Inflation Bounced Back. Unemployment Dropped. So Why Does Everyone Feel Broke?
The economic data says Australia is booming. Your bank account says otherwise. I pulled apart the numbers to find out which one is lying — and what it means for property.
- 12 June 202511 min read·Joey Don
Stop Chasing Brisbane. The Value Play Is Still in Melbourne.
Brisbane has doubled in 4 years. Melbourne is 20-25% cheaper than Sydney. One city is at the top of its cycle. The other is at the bottom. The data says which to buy.
- 15 May 202511 min read·Joey Don
Why Victoria Just Spent Millions Upgrading a Police Station (And What It Means for Investors)
Victoria chose Narre Warren for its only 2023 police station upgrade. The reason: they're building a satellite city hub. What the infrastructure pipeline signals for property values.
- 17 April 202511 min read·Joey Don
Melbourne's Southeast Is in a Rental Crisis. That's Why Prices Are Rising.
Vacancy below 1.5%, open inspections with 30+ groups, rents up 15% in 12 months. How Melbourne's southeast rental shortage is pushing house prices higher.
- 20 March 202511 min read·Joey Don
Melbourne's Market Is Falling — Except in the Suburbs That Are Quietly Rising
The headline says Melbourne property is falling. The data says something more interesting: it depends entirely on which suburb you bought in.
- 20 February 202511 min read·Joey Don
Australia Has 26 Days of Diesel Left. What That Means for Property Investors.
Twenty-six days. That is how much diesel Australia has in reserve. The country has two refineries. They supply 20% of finished fuel demand. The other 80% arrives on ships from overseas. If those ships
- 27 January 202510 min read·Joey Don
Australia's 'New Poor': $2M House, BMW X5, and Technically Bankrupt
I've started calling them the 'high-net-worth poor'. On paper, millionaires. In practice, one unexpected car repair away from a margin call on their life. If that sounds dramatic, wait until I show yo
- 30 December 202412 min read·Joey Don
We Built a Three-Property Portfolio Across Melbourne in 90 Days. Here's the Full Playbook.
A Sydney-based investor with holdings across Australia came to us with one gap in his portfolio: Melbourne. No time to fly down every weekend. Needed a team that could find, buy, renovate, and manage—
- 2 December 202412 min read·Joey Don
You Have $600K to Invest in Melbourne. Here's Exactly Where to Put It.
Six hundred thousand dollars in Melbourne used to buy you options. Today it buys you risk. The suburbs that were $580K at the start of the year are now $650K. If your budget hasn't grown with the mark
- 4 November 202411 min read·Joey Don
The Flipping Bonanza Is Over. Property Investment Is a Business Now.
The era of buying any property and watching it appreciate 20% in twelve months is done. What replaces it is harder, more disciplined, and infinitely more profitable for the people who treat property l
- 7 October 202412 min read·Joey Don
I Studied 13 Quarters of Tasmanian Data. The Population Numbers Are Brutal.
Everyone who got their green card through Tasmania left for Melbourne or Sydney. I know a hundred people who moved back to Melbourne from Tassie. I don't know a single person who went the other direct
- 9 September 202412 min read·Joey Don
Stop Telling Me Tasmania Is the Next Big Thing. It Isn't.
Every few months someone sends me a Domain article about Hobart's property boom and asks whether they should buy there. My answer hasn't changed in five years: no. Let me show you why the numbers don'
- 12 August 202411 min read·Joey Don
Cash Is Melting. Here's How Property Investors Become the Winners.
Your savings account isn't saving anything. While you earn 4% interest, your purchasing power drops 6%. The people getting richer in this environment are the ones who understood one thing early: infla
- 15 July 20249 min read·Yan Zhu
One Number Tells You If a Suburb Will Boom or Flatline for a Decade
There's a single data point that predicted Glen Waverley's stagnation, Box Hill's decline, and Hampton Park's outperformance. It takes three minutes to calculate.
- 23 May 202411 min read·Joey Don
3 Traps That Are Quietly Destroying Middle-Class Wealth in Australia
Every month I watch another hardworking family slide backwards. Not because of bad luck. Because of three specific decisions that look smart on the surface and destroy wealth underneath. I have sat ac
- 25 April 202414 min read·Joey Don
Is Australia Heading for a Japan-Style Property Crash? I Spent 20 Hours Comparing the Data.
People keep saying Australia's property market is a bubble about to burst, just like Japan in the 1990s. I decided to actually check. Twenty hours of data later, the answer turned out to be more compl
- 1 April 202414 min read·Yan Zhu
How I Screen Every Suburb in Australia Before Buying a Single House
Most investors pick suburbs based on vibes. Where their mate bought. Where they grew up. Where the internet told them was 'up and coming.' I use four numbers. Here's the exact screening framework behi
- 29 February 202410 min read·Yan Zhu
Melbourne's 'Most Liveable City' Tag Is a Joke. Here's What the Data Actually Shows.
I've lived in Melbourne for fourteen years. The livability rankings keep coming. So do the homeless camps, the egg shortages, and the anti-immigration protests. Something doesn't add up, and the numbe
- 1 February 202413 min read·Yan Zhu
Debt Recycling: How I Turned $100K of Dead Home Loan Into $2,800 a Year in Tax Savings
Your home loan is costing you more than you think. Not because the interest rate is high—though it probably is. But because every dollar of interest you pay comes from after-tax income. Meanwhile, you
- 4 January 202412 min read·Joey Don
Your ChatGPT Property Prompts Are All Wrong: The Street-Level Data AI Cannot See
A Sydney tech CEO fed 320GB of genomic data into ChatGPT and designed a cancer treatment that shrunk his dog's tumour by 75%. Incredible result. Now ask yourself: when you use AI to find an investment
- 7 December 202313 min read·Yan Zhu
Why the Smartest Property Investors in Australia Never Repay Their Mortgage
A 30-year-old client walked into our office with 15 properties, $10M in mortgage debt, and zero intention of ever repaying a single dollar of principal. He wasn't reckless. He was doing the maths corr
- 9 November 202310 min read·Joey Don
Four Things Selling Agents Say That Should Make You Walk Away
Selling agents are professionally trained to extract the highest possible price from buyers. After 350-plus transactions on the buying side, I have catalogued the four phrases that consistently signal
- 16 October 202310 min read·Joey Don
Our AI Found a $100K Undervalued Property in One Hour. It Took Me Three Days to Believe It.
I have been buying property professionally for years. I have built my career on knowing Melbourne's streets better than Google Maps. And last month, a piece of software found a deal in sixty minutes t
- 18 September 20239 min read·Joey Don
The Free REA Feature That Lets You Monitor Every Property on Your Street
Whether you own property in Australia or not, there is a free feature inside the REA app that most people have never heard of. It will alert you the moment a property on your street — or any street yo
- 14 August 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
Two Hidden Bombs That Will Reshape Australian Property — Construction Costs and Tax Reform
High interest rates aren't the worst thing facing Australian property. Two hidden bombs — runaway construction costs and looming tax reform — are compounding to create a supply crisis that will lock i
- 10 August 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
I'm Middle Class in Australia. Apparently That Makes Me an Idiot.
Everywhere I look online, someone's mocking the middle class for wanting a better life. Upgrade your house? Irresponsible. Partner stays home? Reckless. Private school? You deserve what's coming. Sinc
- 19 June 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
Three Legitimate Reasons to Sell Your Investment Property (And the Golden Rule Behind All of Them)
Knowing when to buy makes you money. Knowing when to sell keeps it. Here are the only three scenarios where selling your investment property actually makes sense — and the one metric that trumps them
- 15 June 202311 min read·Joey Don
Why Paying Cash for Investment Property Is the Most Expensive Mistake You Can Make
I have clients who can afford to pay cash for investment property. And I talk every single one of them out of it. Not because borrowing is fun. Because the maths makes paying cash genuinely irrational
- 27 April 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
The Property Kill Line: What Happens When Prices Drop 20%. Two Australian Cities Found Out.
When property prices drop 20 per cent from their peak, most leveraged investors lose their entire equity buffer. I call it the kill line. Two Australian cities have crossed it. Here is what the data r
- 24 April 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
Over 100 Five-Star Reviews Later, Here's Exactly What We Do Differently
People keep asking what makes our buyer's agency different. After helping 350+ clients build property portfolios across Melbourne, I figured it was time to write it all down in one place. No fluff. Ju
- 6 March 202310 min read·Yan Zhu
Still Picking Suburbs by Distance to the CBD? You're a Decade Behind.
I keep hearing the same outdated advice: 'Buy close to the city and you can't go wrong.' It was true in 1990. It's not true in 2020. Only half of Melbourne's workforce even commutes to the CBD — and m
- 6 February 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
Frankston at $740K on 550sqm: I Analysed Every Angle. Here's the Verdict.
Frankston is having a moment. A rezone in March, a billion-dollar hospital, and median prices still under $800K. A subscriber asked me to analyse a 550-square-metre listing at $740K. The numbers are g
- 9 January 202311 min read·Yan Zhu
Mount Waverley, Heritage Overlay, $1.5 Million. Here Is What Most Buyers Miss.
Mount Waverley is one of those suburbs that photographs well, schools well, and prices terribly for investors. But this particular property has a wrinkle that most people will either miss entirely or
- 12 December 202211 min read·Yan Zhu
Where to Buy a House in Melbourne for $700K. Two Suburbs Nobody Talks About.
Everyone assumes $700,000 in Melbourne means you are stuck in a growth corridor buying a house-and-land package next to a construction site. That assumption is wrong. There are two established suburbs
- 14 November 202211 min read·Yan Zhu
6 Sweet Gum Avenue: The Narre Warren Property Paying $935 a Week After One Addition
When we settled on 6 Sweet Gum Avenue, the numbers were already decent. A three-bedroom house on 620 square metres in one of Narre Warren's quieter pockets, purchased for $762,000. Rent as-is would ha
- 17 October 202210 min read·Yan Zhu
Your Investment Property Gained $200K. Here's How Much You Actually Keep.
Everyone loves talking about capital gains. Nobody loves talking about what happens when you try to take those gains out of the property and put them in your pocket. I ran the numbers on a $200,000 ca
- 19 September 202211 min read·Joey Don
Why You Must Inspect a Luxury Property Twice Before Bidding (Lessons From a $1.8M Mistake)
I stood in the living room of a property in Canterbury that had been marketed as a four-bedroom family home with 'stunning period features.' The marketing photos looked brilliant. The walk-through vid
- 22 August 202212 min read·Yan Zhu
A Granny Flat Is Not a Building. It Is a Financial Product That Returns 18% Per Year.
Most people think of a granny flat as a small building in the backyard. A place for an elderly parent to live, maybe. A teenager's retreat. Something quaint and modest. I think of a granny flat as a l
- 11 July 202210 min read·Yan Zhu
Social Media Is Killing Street-Front Retail Property. Here Is What Smart Investors Buy Instead.
The old rule was simple: buy the shopfront with the most foot traffic. But when a single influencer post drives more customers than a year of walk-ins, the entire commercial property thesis changes. H
- 13 June 202212 min read·Joey Don
I Never Sell Property. Here Is the Maths Behind 'Buy, Borrow, Die.'
My entire investment philosophy boils down to two words: don't sell. People think I am joking. I am not. I am making money. Especially when markets feel uncertain, this principle becomes even more pow
- 16 May 202210 min read·Joey Don
You Are Not Tired. You Are Overthinking. Here Is the Mental Framework That Changed Everything.
I finally figured out why I felt perpetually drained. It was not lack of sleep or too much work. I was thinking during action and acting during thought. The moment I separated the two, everything chan
- 18 April 202211 min read·Joey Don
Every Experienced Investor I Know Is Buying Melbourne Right Now. Here Is Why.
I keep hearing the same thing at industry events: Melbourne is dead, do not touch it, buy Perth instead. Then I watch those same commentators quietly send their own money to Melbourne's southeast. The
- 21 March 202210 min read·Joey Don
I Stopped Listening to Everyone Around Me. Then My Portfolio Exploded.
The hardest thing I ever did in property wasn't negotiating a $40K discount or managing a nightmare tenant. It was telling my family to stop giving me investment advice. That single decision changed e
- 21 February 202211 min read·Joey Don
He Spent $800K of Superannuation on the Wrong Property. Here's Every Mistake He Made.
He thought 600 square metres was enough for development. It wasn't. He put the property in his SMSF without understanding the restrictions. Then he planned renovations that would have triggered penalt
- 24 January 202210 min read·Joey Don
What Ten Years of Work Taught Me About Property, People, and Building Something Real
I left a blockchain company where I grew a department from 5 to 25 people and generated $1.7 million USD in revenue. My boss thought I was crazy. Three years later, I still help him land deals. That a