With Australia's housing crisis worsening, owning a house is increasingly getting out of reach for the ordinary Australian. But with their soaring wealth, the country's billionaires can comfortably own hundreds of thousands of houses.
The Australian Financial Review's Rich List, released last week, reveals the total wealth of Australia's richest 200 people has surged by 160 per cent over the past decade, reaching $667.8 billion in 2025.
Topping the list for the sixth year in a row was mining magnate Gina Rinehart, with an estimated net worth of $38.1 billion.
In stark contrast, the median personal income stands at just $55,062 a year, according to data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Anti-poverty organisation Oxfam says property has been the most frequent source of wealth accumulation for Australia's wealthiest.
The group told SBS News the wealth of the entire Rich List could buy over 680,000 average Australian homes, based on ABS's mean dwelling price of $976,800.
And that divide is growing.
According to Oxfam Australia's analysis of the Rich List, the number of Australian billionaires has more than doubled over the past decade — rising from 74 in 2015 to 161 in 2025.
Over that same period, billionaire wealth has grown on average by more than $137 million a day — or $95,000 every minute.
The average Rich Lister has over 116,000 times the wealth of an Australian in the bottom 50 per cent.
Over the last 10 years, billionaire wealth has grown on average by $95,000 every minute — more than the median Australian taxpayer earns each year. Source: SBS News
'Morally wrong, economically and socially dangerous'
Oxfam is renewing calls for tax reform to address what it describes as "rampant inequality" and ensure the ultra-wealthy contribute their fair share.
"Any billionaire is a sign that our economic system isn't working properly," Oxfam Australia acting chief Chrisanta Muli told SBS News.
"This level of inequality is not just morally wrong — it's economically and socially dangerous. While millions of Australians are struggling to make ends meet, the country’s richest continue to amass eye-watering fortunes, often without lifting a finger.
"Millions of households struggle to put food on the table while the super-rich live in excess."
Oxfam's analysis found the average wealth of someone in the bottom 50 per cent of the population has flatlined at around $28,000 over the past decade, offering little chance of home ownership or long-term financial security.
It said on the other hand, Australia's largest property developer, Harry Triguboff who is the second-richest Australian on the AFR Rich List, has seen his personal wealth more than double — from $13.7 billion in 2016 to $29.7 billion in 2025.
According to Oxfam, that amount could buy more than 30,000 average Australian homes.
Retail, investments and mining/resources were behind property as the most frequent source of wealth accumulation for Australia's richest in the past decade.
The rise of housing unaffordability — and billionaire wealth
Oxfam points out that the boom in personal wealth has coincided with a worsening housing crisis.
According to Anglicare Australia's 2025 Rental Affordability Snapshot:
- Only 0.7 per cent of rental listings are affordable for someone earning a full-time minimum wage.
- Just 12.8 per cent rental properties are affordable for a family of four on two minimum wage incomes.
- For people on JobSeeker, the Disability Support Pension, or the Age Pension, affordable rentals are virtually nonexistent.
"It is scandalous and unjust that property continues to be one of the biggest drivers of wealth across the decade while over 99 per cent of rentals are unaffordable for people earning a full-time minimum wage," Muli said.
The Anglicare Snapshot surveyed 51,238 rental listings across Australia, revealing that just 0.7 per cent of rentals were affordable for someone earning a full-time minimum wage. Source: SBS News
Their analysis showed that you now need to be a high-income household, classified as earning $213,000 a year, to be able to afford to buy half the homes sold in Australia over that year.
Oxfam calls to tax the rich
The organisation is calling on the federal government to conduct a comprehensive review of the tax system to better address wealth accumulation by the super-rich and close what it sees as a failure of the progressive tax system.
They're proposing a wealth tax targeting the richest one per cent, which is believed could raise tens of billions of dollars annually and contribute to healthcare, affordable housing and action on climate change.
"Billionaires pay an effective tax rate of around 0.3 per cent of their wealth globally. Because billionaires grow their wealth through assets, not incomes, the income tax system is failing to properly tax them," Muli said.
