A property investor has sparked outrage after claiming there is no cost-of-living crisis and that Aussies need to stop spending money if they want to buy a house.
Jeremy Iannuzzelli, 35, is a managing partner at Praedium Partners and owns a staggering 15 properties that are worth a combined $20million.
He was recently talking to fellow property investor Jack Handerson on his podcast, and claimed many Aussies were unnecessarily blaming the ‘cost of living crisis’ for their financial woes.
‘I don’t believe we’ve got a cost of living crisis,’ Mr Iannuzzelli said.
‘I believe in my heart we’ve got a cost of spending crisis. People haven’t changed their spending habits in the economy we’re in which is higher interest rates.
‘There’s still people out in cafes. There’s still people spending money.’
Mr Iannuzzelli said people just need to look at their pay packets to realise how well they’re doing.
‘I get to see a lot of people’s incomes and I can definitely tell you people’s incomes for most professions have doubled in the last ten years,’ he said.
‘Definitely people (are) working a lesser amount of days, I’ve definitely seen that.
‘Tradies, all the way to professionals and service industry all the way to retail workers, there’s been an increase in income, no doubt about it.
‘In that four years during Covid it did pop quite a bit. So yes, property prices have increased but there’s been a genuine material change in the increase of wages.’
Mr Henderson agreed with his guest.
‘I’m an employer and incomes have grown significantly, both with what people expect and what you have to pay them,’ he said.
Many online didn’t agree with the pair, saying their incomes haven’t risen nearly as much as they claimed.
‘Hey just letting you know as a wage as a plumber in 2015 was averaging $40 to 50 an hour,’ one wrote.
‘The benchmark now is $45 to 60 on a wage. Let’s be real here. Love your stuff but this is wrong.’
‘Most professions have doubled. I work in HR and I can assure that incomes have not doubled in 10 years,’ another added.
‘Sure, in some professions this may be the case, but most is not the case.’
Over the past ten years, nominal wage growth has generally been slow, averaging around 2.3 per cent.
According to Trading Economics, ‘s seasonally adjusted wage price index increased by 3.2 per cent year-over-year in fourth quarter of 2024.
Annual growth in wages has been above 3 per cent since late 2022.
According to AI Group, public sector wages growth (3.7 per cent) is currently higher than in the private sector (3.5 per cent).
National house price growth outstripped wages by 1.9 per cent over the same period, according to KPMG.
Mr Iannuzzelli took to a podcast in January to explain how he was able to build a staggering $20million property portfolio.
He said he began investing in property in his early twenties, and by the time turned 28 he boasted a portfolio of 15 properties.
Mr Henderson, 28, claims he has built a property portfolio worth about $35million after working as a labourer to buy his first Sydney home at 18.
His first first property was a $720,00 two-bedroom apartment in the beachside suburb of Coogee. He saved the money for his deposit while still living at home.
He previously told SBS Insight the reason many younger ns are struggling to buy property is because they ‘want everything right now’.
The average price of a residential dwelling in is $976,800, according to the n Bureau of Statistics’ March 11 release.
That figure equates to more than 13 times the national, median full-time wage.
The median home price across ‘s major cities is $1.008million.