Quote Originally Posted by mfd View Post
I'm not sure why you quote floating rather than a sub-4% fixed interest rate. If you have a setup where this is deductible against your share profits, it's even easier.

Sub 4% fixed rate? The 5-6% figure is the range for 'line of credit or revolving line of credit' or basically, loans for those that want to borrow against the equity of their homes, such as here:


https://www.bnz.co.nz/personal-banki...ome-loan-rates


NOT sub-4% rates for residential "owner OCCUPIED" as such here:


https://www.bnz.co.nz/personal-banking/home-loans


and I won't get into margin lending rates from brokers like Fosryth Barr etc, they're going to be a lot higher.


Banks have a very different business model and risk profile to share investors. Your question is like asking why a bank would lend to a farm rather than just growing food for a profit, why lend to a house investor rather than just buying the house themselves and renting it out? Different entities have different motives.

Actually no. It has everything to do with the risk level involved. The bank is not going to care what you do with the $ you borrow on a line of credit if they have the house as security. Go try offering the banks that you have shares in a company as collateral and they'll gladly show you the door. The distinction i'm trying to make is, the asset class of a house is world's apart different than owning shares of a company. When it's very clear that banks that do the lending attach different rates (ie go look at lending rates for corporate or business ventures....). If you want to make the risk adjusted distinction of using funds borrowed against the equity of the house, and then go buying shares, then the base break even rate return should be comparable to what banks would lend to corporations - so around 8% or higher. Anotherwords, the person doing this venture should be considering a break even of 5% but rather, 8% or what ever the corporate lending rate would be (to factor the risk the individual is taking).




Your other point comparing share investing to property ignores the possibility of a housing crash, which have happened before, will happen again, and could happen here. Being careful with leverage applies equally to property investors as it does to share investors.

No it doesn't. The extent of past housing crashes and frequency have been minimal compared to the crash in share market indices etc. As I mentioned before the 2 asset classes are worlds apart. For starters we have the Reserve Bank that put priority to NZ's real estate than any specific corporation or industry sector. It's an issue of too big to fail - the adjusting of the reserve bank interest rate adjusts purely to keep housing prices buoyant (and indirectly, the whole economy). Any such crashes in the housing market are minimised by these monetary controls. They do not care to the extent what happens on the corporate side or the NZ share market, and because of this, this is the key reason why the banks have no issues lending on 1st time buyer of a home with NO collateral, but it's a horse of a different colour when ask to lend on share equities or business ventures without collateral.


Another thing to consider. What would be the extent of the NZ economy if there was a major housing crash? I'm talking say a 50% or 60% drop within a 2 year period? I'll tell you. Your share equities would do far worse. No one is immuned in a market crash but one thing certain is real estate fares better than any other asset class when the whole economy is turned upsidedown.