Saturday, May 06, 2006

Property investors hit hard: "A GROWING band of Sydney home owners who bought near the peak of the property boom in late 2003 are facing negative equity as property prices sag.... Prices have now fallen 9.6 per cent on average since property prices turned, slashing the city's median home value from $570,000 to $516,000."

"Late last year an American pro-growth consultancy named Demographia announced that the median house in this city cost 8.5 times the median household income. This was up from a multiple of five in the 1980s, which even then was steep. Demographia defines "affordable" as a multiple of no more than three. The 2005 result meant housing in Sydney was the sixth least affordable of 100 cities looked at around the world."

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