Is Peter Dutton in any position to have a dig at the prime minister for his new $4.3 million clifftop house given the opposition leader’s extensive property investments over the years?
After Anthony Albanese drew a sketch of Dutton on Nova 93.7 last year that looked a lot like a potato, the opposition leader returned fire when he appeared on the station this week and drew a picture of a clifftop house, with a message beside it wishing Albo a happy (and imminent?) retirement.
The prime minister’s decision last October to buy a beach house in Copacabana with his fiancé Jodie was tin-eared given the housing crisis, but it was probably impolitic of Dutton to join the pile-on given how many properties he’s owned and profited from in the past.
Dutton and his wife Kirilly currently own only one property, a farm in Dayboro just north of Brisbane that they bought for $2.165 million in 2020. However, interest disclosure records show the Duttons have owned nine properties between them since 2014.
Their most recent sale was a luxury Brisbane penthouse, which they flipped for $3.47 million in 2022 after purchasing it only a year before for $2.7 million. In 2022 Kirilly sold a Townsville investment property — which had been held by a family trust that she is the beneficiary of — for an unknown sum.
In 2021 Dutton offloaded his investment properties in Brisbane’s Spring Hill, the Gold Coast (for $6 million after buying it in 2014 for $2.325 million), and Moreton Island.
In 2020 Dutton and Kirilly sold their family home in Camp Mountain for $1.8 million, which they had bought in 2004 for $710,000. Then in 2019, Dutton sold his Canberra bolt hole for $540,000. In 2014 Kirilly sold her Everton Park investment property.
We don’t have enough space to list every house Dutton has ever owned, but Nine’s Title Deeds column reported in 2022 that he has bought and sold a dozen properties since the age of 19. That’s quite a side hustle.
The prime minister is not at Dutton’s level in the real estate game, but he’s bought six properties since 1990 and sold four, all at healthy profits. Last November he sold his Dulwich Hill investment property for $1.75 million, $575,000 above the purchase price he bought it for in 2015. And in 2022, shortly after moving into The Lodge, he sold his redundant Canberra flat for $662,500 — a nice capital gain given he only bought it for $162,000 in 1996.
But Albanese’s most profitable investment to date has been the $2.3 million sale of a Marrickville rental property he used to own with his former wife Carmel Tebbutt — more than double what they bought it for in 2012. He’ll also do well if he ever decides to sell his former Marrickville residence, which was valued at around $2.65 million in 2024.
The remarkable thing is that Albanese and Dutton are not even outliers compared to their peers: nearly 40% of MPs or their families own three or more properties and 20% own four or more. And they are nowhere near the wealthiest landowners. That honour is shared between Labor MP Andrew Charlton and independent Allegra Spender, both of whom have portfolios valued at well over $40 million.
Dutton’s office declined to comment, while Albanese’s office did not reply to an email seeking comment.
Have something to say about this article? Write to us at letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication in Crikey’s Your Say. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
