Comments on Australia’s rising house prices

Steve Keen
Extracted from a LinkedIn posting and Youtube video [1]

Australia’s housing obsession is one of its greatest weaknesses.

Rising house prices are not a sign of prosperity.

What they actually tell you is that more money is being borrowed from the banking sector to buy homes.

The cause of rising house prices is rising household debt, and that is unproductive.

House prices are now five times more expensive than consumer goods compared to 1970. We should never have allowed that to happen.

Housing should not be an asset.

It is not something you should profit out of. It is something you should live in.

The people who really benefit from rising house prices are real estate agents and property developers, not the families who live in them.

We are paupers living inside castles. Paying a fortune on the mortgage, a fortune on private schools, and out of the remainder, just trying to live.

1. Extracted from Steve’s LinkedIn posting on 13 June 2026. This topic is discussed with further detail in the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Dcb3LZISjw. Also visit Steve’s website: https://www.stevekeen.com

Dr Steve Keen is the world’s leading critic of neoclassical economics and is a major contributor to the development of an alternative, complex-systems software model of the economy, utilising a monetary approach to economics. He predicted the 2008 financial crisis years early. Steve is an honorary professor at University College London, and has authored several books.