The Politics of Foreign Investment in Australian Housing: Chinese Investors, Translocal Sales Agents and Local Resistance

Abstract

This article analyses the cultural, housing and intergovernmental politics of individual foreign investment in Australian real estate. The first section provides a brief history of Australia's housing system and shows the historical trend toward housing affordability ‘problems’ in Sydney and Melbourne. This review interrogates the claim Chinese investors compounded Australia's housing affordability problem after the global financial crisis. The second more substantive section draws on interview, real estate website and media data to demonstrate how the Australian housing system and Chinese and Australian actors enabled Chinese investment in Australian real estate. The third section demonstrates how a minority of Australian residents and some journalists are contesting Chinese foreign investment in Australian real estate. This study shows how contemporary global real estate relations complicate the politics of Asian real estate investment in Anglo-sphere countries.