A report from ABC News in Australia. "House prices are tipped to fall by 11 per cent over the next three years as the COVID-related economic downturn bites, and for one group of Australian homeowners, it could not come at a worse time. There are an estimated 730,000 investors, many of whom are self-funded retirees or people planning for retirement, who have taken out interest-only bank loans in the belief property was a safe bet. Now these private landlords are facing big hikes in their monthly bank repayments as they switch from interest-only to paying off the principal of their loans as well."

"Max Green is one of many who has been trying to negotiate with the banks for an extension to the interest-only period of his loans. The 69-year-old and his partner have bought two properties — one in Brisbane, the other in Perth — in the past 10 years to help fund their retirement. But the value of the Brisbane property has flatlined and the Perth property, a unit in the city's outer suburbs, has plummeted from $425,000 in 2016 to $300,000 today, according to a recent valuation."

"'The intent was … to provide us with some equity growth in the properties, which would then assist us in the future once I had retired,' Mr Green said. Instead, the couple face paying an additional $1,900 a month from July as they begin to pay off both the principal and interest on their loans. Mr Green said he still enjoyed his work as a project manager at WA's Water Corporation, but conceded his retirement ambitions had not gone to plan."

"He said he would now be forced to either keep working beyond 70, dip into the couple's superannuation to pay the banks, or sell at a loss. Others with similar investment plans have already decided to cut their losses and are now facing negative equity as a result — where their home is worth less than the amount they owe."

"Wayne Grimes, 50, said he couldn't help but laugh when he considered the price he would likely now get for his luxury investment unit. 'I'm laughing because it is just ridiculous,' he said. 'I bought it for $670,000 … and I'll be lucky if I'm able to sell it for $400,000. We had been advised that we would be able to extend the interest-only period."

"The two-bedroom, two-bathroom house in the inner-city area of West Perth has been on the market for five weeks, but Mr Grimes has wanted to sell it since 2017 when his interest-only loan was converted to principal and interest. 'Originally when I bought that place I was getting $895 a week in rent and now I get about $415 a week,' Mr Grimes said. 'That coupled with [paying] principal and interest, there has been a big hit to our cash flow.'"

"Like many investors, Mr Grimes put his savings into property to try to get ahead for retirement. 'The whole idea behind it was so that we wouldn't have to rely on government pensions and government handouts when we got older, that we would be self-sufficient and create our own wealth,' he said. 'But it hasn't worked out that way.'"

"Mr Grimes said his bank had been very helpful in allowing him to defer his loan payments for six months due to coronavirus, which would buy him time to sell the West Perth property, albeit at a huge a loss. He faced being left with a $180,000 debt. 'I'm not here to blame anyone, it's no-one's fault, it's just that this is how the market has gone,' he said."

"Analyst Martin North, from Digital Finance Analytics, said 8 per cent of property investors were looking to offload their properties in the coming months. Mr North said the COVID-19 crisis had created another pressure point for investors already struggling with the migration of their loans to principal and interest, plus other factors."

"'We've got a perfect storm emerging, particularly for property investors,' he said. 'We've had a very significant increase in the number of units on the market and some of those would have previously been used by international students, but of course they didn't come back [for the new term]. Some of those would have been used by Airbnb, but they haven't come back.'"

"But Mr North said he did not support Senator Smith's call on banks to extend the interest-only terms for property investors. 'Strategically, it does not make a lot of sense to me,' he said. 'We've got to deal with the amount of debt in the system. We have too many property owners with too much debt, they're too leveraged.'"

The Australian Financial Review. "Sales of new housing lots in Sydney, Melbourne and south-east Queensland collapsed in the first six weeks of the COVID-19 lockdown as buyers held off making purchase decisions due to job loss fears. New figures compiled by land market specialist Research4 show the country's three biggest greenfield markets suffered net sales falls of between 60 per cent and 80 per cent between late March and the end of April, compared with the first quarter of the year when the land market was relatively buoyant."

"Adding to the pain for housing developers was a huge rise in the number of lots returned for resale that had previously been allocated to home builders or reported as sold. According to Research4, more than 60 per cent of previously allocated lots were returned to developers in Sydney and south-east Queensland with almost 40 per cent of lots returned to developers in Victoria."

"Colin Keane, director at Research4, said based on its latest research, activity in greenfield markets (sales and new lot releases) fell by an estimated 58 per cent nationwide. In mid-April, Terry Portelli, the founder and managing director of land sales agency Red23, said inquiries across the 19 Melbourne and Geelong housing estates the group was marketing had 'dropped dramatically' since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the market in March."

"'The number-one issue is job security. People on our database who were in a position to buy are now questioning that decision,' he said."

""Homebuilders have already started to feel the pain with Perth-based ABN Group, the country's third-largest home builder last year, extending salary cuts made to executive pay packets to all staff."