Originally Posted by
Bjauck
Buying as expensive a main residence as you (think you) can afford - including raiding Kiwisaver (for first home buyers), getting stonking mortgages at many multiples of income, diverting income that may have gone into a financial pension fund into payments for a house.
The reasons seem obvious with respect to the owner occupied main residence. Capital gains (often/usually leveraged too) and imputed annual net rent are tax free. These are politically untouchable. Whereas financial pension funds face annual income tax charges, and cannot be leveraged to boost capital gains. Taxable income also seems to be fair game for being taxed harder to fund covid and other expenses - so that untaxed annual benefit of home ownership will look increasingly appealing.
So worth pouring as much as possible into your house, after all you could always downsize or reverse mortgage in retirement?