The system needs perpetual ascent. It cannot tolerate stability.
Across Australia, a quiet crisis has been unfolding not in the headlines but in the lived experience of millions watching homeownership recede like a tide that never returns. Filmmaker Kane Guglielmi, moved by personal hardship and a sense that something fundamental had gone wrong, has produced a documentary tracing the roots of unaffordable housing to the way societies choose — or fail — to tax land and manage shared natural wealth. Drawing on the ideas of 19th-century reformer Henry George and the policy examples of Singapore, Norway, and Alaska, the film asks an old question with new urgency: who truly owns the value that a community creates together?
- Australian property prices remain 5.8% above last year's already unaffordable levels, with regional markets hitting record highs, exposing a system structurally dependent on endless price growth.
- The human toll is not abstract — rising costs have fractured communities, pushed homeownership beyond reach for millions, and contributed to depression among those who played by the rules and still lost ground.
- Guglielmi's documentary Common Wealth challenges the assumption that this is simply how markets work, introducing Georgist land tax principles that argue society — not private owners — creates most of the value land holds.
- International models from Singapore's sustainable homeownership rates to Norway's $3 trillion sovereign wealth fund demonstrate that different policy choices produce radically different outcomes for ordinary citizens.
- The film lands not as a manifesto but as a provocation, leaving audiences with questions about resource giveaways and speculative incentives that Australian political debate has long preferred to leave unasked.
The headlines say Australian house prices are falling, down 0.9 per cent from their peak. But the fuller picture is more unsettling: national values remain 5.8 per cent higher than a year ago, regional medians have climbed 9.5 per cent to record levels, and cities like Perth and Brisbane have nearly doubled in price over five years. Sydney's median dwelling now costs $1.23 million. The system, it seems, cannot function without perpetual ascent — and any pause triggers panic among those whose wealth depends on the game continuing forever.
It was this strangeness that drove Kane Guglielmi to make his documentary, Common Wealth. Returning to Australia after the pandemic, he found property prices accelerating beyond any rational foundation. The experience contributed to a serious depression. Rather than accept it, he began investigating — and that investigation took him from a Melbourne think tank to Singapore, Norway, Alaska, and beyond.
At Prosper Australia, economist Karl Fitzgerald introduced Guglielmi to the ideas of Henry George, a 19th-century American reformer who argued that land value — created by society through infrastructure and growth — is captured almost entirely by private owners rather than the communities that generated it. For someone who described himself as conservatively raised, the concepts were initially confronting.
His travels revealed that other societies had made different choices. Singapore built high homeownership rates while keeping prices sustainable. Norway converted oil revenues into a $3 trillion sovereign wealth fund for all citizens. Alaska pays every resident an annual dividend from resource wealth. These were not utopian experiments — they were policy decisions, made deliberately, with different values at their centre.
Guglielmi financed the film through donations, with major contributors explicitly surrendering editorial control. The result is less a set of answers than a sustained series of questions: Why does Australia give away its natural resources so cheaply? Why does the system penalise those who refuse to speculate on property? He does not pretend to resolve them. But as media attention fixates on a modest monthly price dip, those questions hang in the air — patient, unanswered, and growing harder to ignore.
The news cycle screams crisis. Australian house prices have fallen for three consecutive months, down 0.9 per cent from their peak. Auction clearance rates are collapsing. The sky, it seems, is falling. But step back from the headlines and a stranger picture emerges: national property values remain 5.8 per cent higher than they were a year ago. A year ago, we were already complaining that houses cost too much. Now they cost even more. In regional Australia, the median property price sits 9.5 per cent higher than twelve months prior, touching record levels everywhere except Queensland. The system, it appears, cannot tolerate stability. It needs perpetual ascent.
Sydney's median dwelling now costs $1.23 million, up 17.5 per cent over five years. Brisbane has climbed to $1.07 million, a staggering 84.6 per cent increase in the same period. Perth reached $1.01 million, up 96.2 per cent. Adelaide sits at $942,000, up 81.2 per cent. These are not abstract figures. They represent the lived experience of millions of Australians watching homeownership slip further from reach, watching communities fracture under the weight of unaffordable shelter. The paradox is this: the housing market has become so dependent on ever-rising prices that any decline—even a modest one—triggers panic among those whose wealth and livelihoods depend on the game continuing upward forever.
Filmmaker Kane Guglielmi found himself asking why. He had left Australia as the pandemic began, and when he returned shortly after, he was struck by something almost unreal: property prices had accelerated to levels that seemed divorced from any rational economic foundation. The experience contributed to a deep depression. Rather than accept the mystery, he decided to investigate it, and that investigation became a documentary called Common Wealth. Guglielmi presents himself as an ordinary Australian—a man with a small family, a mortgage, and modest ambitions. But he had begun to notice that the housing system was tearing communities apart, and he wanted to understand why.
His journey led him to economist Karl Fitzgerald at Prosper Australia, a think tank tracing its lineage to the 1890s. Fitzgerald introduced Guglielmi to ideas rooted in the work of Henry George, a 19th-century American land reformer who argued that governments could dramatically reduce taxes on labour and business if they learned to tax land properly. The core insight is this: land value increases through the productive efforts of society—infrastructure, population growth, economic development—yet that value is captured almost entirely by private landowners rather than the community that created it. For a self-described conservatively-raised capitalist, these concepts were initially confronting.
Guglielmi then travelled internationally to see how other nations had approached the problem differently. In Singapore, a city-state famous for its scarcity of land, he discovered that officials had drawn on similar Georgist principles to build high rates of home ownership while keeping property prices low and sustainable. He visited the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Mexico, Italy, and the United States, each conversation raising fresh questions about Australia's policy choices. In Norway, he learned about a $3 trillion sovereign wealth fund, built from oil and gas revenues and managed for the benefit of all Norwegians. In Alaska, he encountered the Alaska Permanent Fund, which converts finite resource wealth into an annual dividend paid to every resident.
The film does not pretend to offer solutions. Instead, it traces a path from simple questions about house prices to deeper ones about land ownership, resource rents, natural resources, and democratic choice. Guglielmi leaves the audience to draw its own conclusions, but the questions linger: Why does Australia give away its natural resources for so little? Why does the system punish those who refuse to play the property game? He financed the film through donations and personal investment, with large donors explicitly agreeing to no editorial control. He contacted every guest independently, following his research wherever it led.
Guglielmi's previous film, a 2016 romantic comedy called Cooped Up, depicted a man who contracts a coronavirus in China and returns to Sydney to quarantine—a storyline that became eerily prescient when COVID-19 arrived four years later. This new work is less whimsical but perhaps more urgent. He recalls the moment in 2022 when the Reserve Bank began raising interest rates aggressively after years of historically low borrowing costs had inflated property values. He had played by the rules, taken on debt to become a property owner, and suddenly the entire system felt rigged against ordinary people. The film asks whether Australia can do better, whether a society might choose different policies around housing and resource taxation, whether a better future for the next generation is possible. For now, as media attention fixates on last month's modest price decline, those questions hang in the air, unanswered.
Citas Notables
He felt the whole system was rigged against normal people when interest rates began rising aggressively in 2022 after he had played by the rules and taken on debt to become a property owner.— Kane Guglielmi, filmmaker
Land value increases through the productive efforts of society, but rising land values are often captured by private owners rather than by the community.— Karl Fitzgerald, economist at Prosper Australia
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why did a filmmaker decide to make a documentary about housing policy? That's an unusual choice.
He came back to Australia after the pandemic started and was genuinely shocked by what had happened to property prices. It wasn't intellectual curiosity—it was personal distress. He felt depressed by it, and that pushed him to understand the mechanics.
But what does he actually discover? Does he find a villain, or a solution?
Neither, really. He finds a system. He learns about land value capture, about how communities create wealth through development and infrastructure, but private landowners pocket the gains. He sees how other countries—Singapore, Norway, Alaska—have structured things differently.
So the film is basically saying Australia made bad choices?
It's asking why Australia made those choices. Why do we tax labour and business income heavily while barely taxing land? Why do we give resource wealth away cheaply? He doesn't answer it. He leaves that to the audience.
Does he seem angry about it?
Not angry. Confused, maybe. He presents himself as someone who played by the rules, took on debt, became a homeowner—and then felt the system turn against him when interest rates rose. He's trying to understand how it got this way.
And the prices keep rising anyway, even after the recent falls?
That's the trap. The system needs prices to keep rising. A small decline causes panic because so much wealth and so many livelihoods depend on perpetual growth. It's not sustainable, but it's what we've built.