​The Chinese Housing Boom Down Under

This article was first published in 2014 in The Financialist
 
Want to buy a home in Australia? You’ll need to compete with the Chinese. Wealthy Chinese are pouring more than $5 billion a year into the Australian property market, accounting for 12 percent of the new housing supply per year, according to a Credit Suisse report entitled “The Chinese Property Boom Down Under.”

And it looks as if they’ll be accounting for even more: Chinese spending in Australia’s residential market totaled $24 billion over the past seven years; Credit Suisse estimates a near-doubling to $44 billion over the next seven.

It’s not just Australia’s cleaner air or beautiful beaches that are attracting Chinese money. Chinese investors are scouring the globe for compelling investment opportunities since their banks are offering low or negative real interest on deposits and Beijing is restricting property purchases.

​The boom is jacking up property prices in Sydney, Melbourne and other cities to among the highest in the world.