What percentage of Australians own investment property?

ATO Tax Statistics each year publishes the most reliable national data on property investment. As of recent ATO publications: roughly 2.2 million Australians declared rental property income on their tax return, about 20% of all taxpayers.

Distribution: 71% of property investors own 1 property, 19% own 2, 6% own 3, 2% own 4-5, less than 2% own 6+. So multi-property investors are a small minority of an already-small minority. Most 'property investors' are first-IP buyers, not portfolio builders.

Geographic: NSW + VIC dominate the investor pool simply because they're the population centres. QLD has the highest investor-as-share-of-taxpayers ratio (driven by SEQ + holiday-rental Gold Coast). NT + TAS have the lowest absolute counts, lower ratios.

Negative-gearing prevalence: of those investors, roughly 60% report a rental loss (i.e. negatively-geared) in any given year, though this drops materially as rates compress + rents rise. As of 2024 ATO data, the majority of investors are positively-geared on a cashflow basis for the first time in 15+ years.