Tax & Deductions
Claim everything you are entitled to. Guides to deductions, depreciation, capital gains, and record keeping for Australian rental properties.
Real estate's AUSTRAC enrolment deadline is Wednesday. Every landlord's next sale, purchase or related-party transfer is now an AML/CTF transaction
AUSTRAC's Tranche 2 enrolment deadline for Australia's real estate agents, buyer's agents, developers and conveyancers is Wednesday 29 July 2026. Around 100,000 businesses have been in scope since 1 July. Landlords buying, selling or transferring an investment property now face customer due diligence, beneficial-owner checks and, in higher-risk cases, source-of-funds questions. Penalties run to $33 million per breach for a body corporate. Here is what a landlord actually experiences at their next transaction and how to keep it out of a settlement delay.
76,300 jobs added in June, five times the forecast. Q2 CPI on 29 July decides the RBA's 11 August move
Australia added 76,300 jobs in June 2026 and the unemployment rate held at 4.4%, the ABS reported on 23 July. The June quarter CPI drops at 11:30am on 29 July, six trading days before the RBA's two-day board meeting on 10-11 August. A 25bp hike would take the cash rate to 4.60%, a 15-year high. Here is the mortgage bill on a $600k investor loan across the three scenarios that are actually in play for landlords.
ATO to cross-check 2.3 million property records against 2025-26 landlord returns. 9 in 10 got it wrong last year
The ATO's property management data-matching program pulls records for roughly 2.3 million individuals a year from property management software companies for 2018-19 through 2025-26. A parallel rental bond program pulls about 2.2 million individuals a year from state and territory bond authorities. Sharing economy feeds from Airbnb, Stayz and Booking.com have been direct since July 2024. Any landlord lodging a 2025-26 return this month is walking into that net. Here is what the ATO already has on your rental before you press submit.
Help to Buy took 10,000 new places on 1 July. Entry-level stock is where investors now bid against a 2% deposit
Housing Australia opened 10,000 new Help to Buy places on 1 July 2026 and lifted the taxable income caps to $103,000 for singles and $165,000 for joint or single parent applicants. Property price caps were reindexed on the same day, with Sydney sitting at $1.3 million on the standard cap. The scheme is now available in every state and territory after Tasmania joined in June. Sub-cap Sydney houses ran 4.1% in the six months to April 2026 while above-cap stock fell 1.1%, per the Cotality data cited by Domain. Here is what the mid-2026 Help to Buy expansion actually does to a landlord bidding for entry-level rental stock in Sydney, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.
15 lenders now sit below 5.90% while the RBA holds at 4.35%. The mid-2026 investor refi window is open
18 lenders have cut variable home loan rates since the RBA's 16 June 2026 hold at 4.35%, according to Canstar's rate tracker. AMP Bank cut fixed rates by up to 50 basis points, the largest fixed-rate move of the cycle. Bendigo Bank took a variable product to 5.89%. Macquarie's two- and three-year fixed sit at 5.19% for owner-occupiers and investors. Fifteen lenders now offer variable rates below 5.90%. Here is what the mid-2026 rate war does to a $1 million investor loan, the 12-month runway to the 1 July 2027 negative gearing reset, and the refinance calendar decision an Australian landlord needs to make this fortnight.
Sydney house rents added $50 in a quarter to a record $850. Darwin vacancy hit 0.1%
Domain's June Quarter 2026 Rent Report, released 8 July, put Sydney house rents up $50 in three months to a record $850 a week, the sharpest quarterly lift since 2022. Darwin's vacancy rate collapsed to 0.1%. Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth and Hobart barely moved. Domain's chief economist reads landlord behaviour as pricing in the 1 July 2027 negative gearing reset. Here is the city-by-city split and what it does to a leveraged investor's yield calculation.
From 10 August SMSFs can't borrow to buy residential property. Contracts signed by 9 August count
The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Act 2026 received Royal Assent on 26 June 2026. From 10 August 2026, self managed super funds are banned from entering new limited recourse borrowing arrangements to acquire residential property. Existing LRBAs are grandfathered, business real property is preserved, and refinancing is still available if the principal balance does not increase. SMSFs already hold about $178 billion in property. Here is what the 45 day contract window means for a trustee planning to add a residential rental to the fund and how the ban reshapes SMSF property strategy from FY2026-27 onward.
Westpac now sees a 2% national price fall this year and a 20% turnover slump as buyer sentiment cracks
The Westpac-Melbourne Institute Index of House Price Expectations dropped 14.9% to 128.2 in June 2026, below its long-run average for the first time in nearly three years. In the same round of forecasts, Westpac's June Housing Pulse pencilled in a 2% national price fall for 2026 and a 20% collapse in market turnover as the Federal Budget's negative gearing and CGT reset scheduled for 1 July 2027 pulls investors out of established stock. Grandfathered investors have a 12-month positioning window. Here is what the sentiment turn and the forecast revision mean for a landlord's refinance, rent review and hold-sell calendar into the second half of 2026.
Sydney lost 3.2% over the June quarter. Rents still grew 5.9%
Cotality's June 2026 Home Value Index has the national index down 0.4% for the month, the biggest single-month fall since December 2022. Sydney lost 1.2% in June and 3.2% for the quarter, Melbourne 1.0% and 2.6%. ABS Building Approvals for May 2026, released the same week, put apartment approvals down 10.4% while data centres pushed non-residential building to a record $10.83 billion. Rents still grew 5.9%. Here is what the June turn does to a leveraged landlord's yield, refinance window and buying calendar into the second half of 2026.
Sydney fell 1.2%, Melbourne 1.0% in June. Cotality's national index dropped 0.4%, the sharpest fall since December 2022
Cotality's June 2026 Home Value Index landed on 1 July with the sharpest monthly drop the national index has recorded since December 2022. Sydney is down 3.2% for the June quarter and Melbourne 2.6%, with combined capitals off 1.3% over the same three months. National rent growth is running at 5.9% and yields have edged up to 3.45%. Here is what the deepening downturn means for a leveraged Sydney or Melbourne landlord starting FY2026-27 on the back foot.
Division 296 starts 1 July. SMSFs holding $177 billion in property have one shot at today's market value
From 1 July 2026, Division 296 adds 15% tax to the proportion of SMSF earnings tied to a member's total super balance above $3 million. The Better Targeted Super Concessions package received Royal Assent on 13 March 2026 with one important sweetener for SMSFs: a one-off election to reset the cost base of every CGT asset to its 30 June 2026 market value for Division 296 purposes only. With $60.9 billion of residential and $116.7 billion of commercial property sitting inside the SMSF system, today is the valuation date that has to be locked. Here is what the reset is worth, what the valuation rules demand, and where the trap is for an SMSF landlord with a single lumpy property.
ATO's 10.96% interest charge is no longer deductible. FY26 landlord returns are the first to wear it
The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Incentives and Integrity) Act 2025 stripped tax deductibility from the ATO's General Interest Charge and Shortfall Interest Charge for any amount incurred from 1 July 2025. With GIC sitting at 10.96% for the April to June 2026 quarter and stepping up to 11.43% from 1 July 2026, the FY2025-26 lodgement is the first time a landlord with a tax shortfall wears the full rate. EOFY 30 June 2026 is Tuesday. Here is what landlords still have time to do, and where the ATO's 1.7 million-loan data-matching net is pointed for this tax time.