Open Mike Wednesday 2nd October

1. How come the suggestion that David Shearer made (when still the leader of Labour) to stop overseas buyers (non citizens or permanent residents) buying NZ property-land, seems to have disappeared from the ‘radar’.
   I’m surprised this hasn’t been discussed further. It seems to me a ‘no brainer’.

   There is basically free money being printed in the USA, Europe, Japan etc and it needs to ‘find a home’. So it buys ‘rentals’ in countries kind enough to have no ‘checks and balances’, e.g. NZ. (most other ‘sane-normal’ countries ‘ban foreigners’ owing property, or tax them significantly.

   We in NZ do neither and as a consequence, ‘hot money’ is flushed into our housing market. Add on top of that illegal money finding a ‘no questions asked’ haven, and we have the mess we’re in today.

   This housing madness can only end badly if it continues as is.

   You know when your property market is ‘healthy’ when average house prices are about 2.5 to 3.5 times average salary (depending on if it’s a major business centre). And rents offer about a 7% average yield.

   We are no where near either and it is not to difficult to guess why.

   We should either ‘ban foreign ownership’ OR print our own money. Because presently we get the worst of both, without ANY benefit, except for those few ‘property speculators’.

   Am I the only person with this opinion?

   Kevin, Beach Haven

2. So we have the american federal government shut down and the world is still here.
   Have you ever wondered what would happen here?

   OK enough – if you need a fix from the 80’s try this – XTC King for a day.

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1qckKZ7ewE

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