Can ‘rich Chinese parents' save our great Australian Dream?

SBS Australia

14-05-2025

My mom is looking to sell her properties overseas just to help me purchase a house here… they're really worried that if they pass away, who's going to look after me. And they just want to feel safe knowing that I have a roof above my head. Joanne Phua, a Vietnamese-Chinese Australian fashion influencer is a series about what it is like to be young and Chinese in today's Australia, hosted by and for young Chinese Australians. In this season, we ask more difficult, relevant, spicy and sexy questions for you, so that you can be heard.
SBS Audio
14/05/2025 28:12
Credits:
Host: Wing Kuang and Dennis Fang
Producer: Bertin Huynh
Art: Joanna Hu
SBS Team: Joel Supple and Max Gosford
Wing Kuang
This podcast was recorded on the land of the Camaraygal people and Whadjuk people. We'd like to pay our respects to elders past and present and recognise their continuous connection to Country. Welcome to Chinese-ish, an SBS podcast about what is it like to be young and Chinese in Australia today. My name is Wing, and I'm a former Chinese international student.
Dennis Fang
And I'm Dennis, a second-generation Chinese Australian from Western Sydney. Wing, I heard that your parents just visited you from China recently.
Wing Kuang
Yes and they heard a lot about you and considered you a successful 28-year-old Chinese kid for being able to buy your own house and pay your own mortgage already.
Dennis Fang
Thanks, Auntie and Uncle Kuang. So I bought my own place during the middle of COVID, which for someone in their 20s seemed like a huge achievement, but the reality is quite different, because, guess what? It was funded by the Bank of mum and dad.
Wing Kuang
It's been a news term throughout the last year, like the 'Bank of Mum and Dad', which means your parents step in and help you financially to get a house. But to be frank, when I first heard of this term, my reaction was like, this is actually a really Chinese thing.
Dennis Fang
But I think the question is, in the Australian context, can our "rich Chinese parents" still help us get into the property market.
Wing Kuang
Well our guests this week can perhaps contribute to this conversation. We first have Christopher Tan, a young Australian, Chinese journalist living in Perth who has just bought his first property with his partner.
Christopher Tan
Wing Kuang
And we also have Joanne aka Bamitjoanne, a Vietnamese-Chinese Sydney-based fashion influencer who is ready to move into her own place. Is that correct?
Joanne
Dennis Fang
Now, let's start with this question, both of you, what are your living arrangements like right now?
Christopher Tan
For myself and my partner, we're both in our sort of mid 20s, the goal was to always buy a house, even if it took, you know, a long time, and that's just because of wanting to build a family of ourselves, and wanting that privacy from our family as well. It took us about sort of four years of saving, of really saving, since we started our careers. For us, our story sort of really began in July last year, when we finally got into a home which is where I am at the moment. And you took, you know, months, years of looking, of trying, of getting rejected, long lines, all these pictures that you see over in Sydney is very similar here in Perth in terms of the rental market and the housing market and Yeah, after all that persevering, we finally got into our home in July. And
Wing Kuang
How about you, Joanne? you are renting right now in Sydney.
Joanne
Yes, that's correct. I'm still living the guilt free life of living in Surrey Hills. I have a housemate. It's actually a bit cheeky, because we are renting a one bedroom, but we've turned the studio into a second bedroom so my poor housemate does not have a door.
Dennis Fang
Does not have a door. How does that work?
Joanne
It's technically like a one bed one studio, meaning the studio...It was previously used as an office, but because it's a huge it's quite a large studio, actually, we've tried to put a bed in there, and it worked. So now he has a bed. He has like a TV and cabinet and everything. He just has no windows. And I think we're comfortable with each other now that we can, like, live like that. I'm very, very fortunate that he gave me the bedroom. I actually offered and said, you know, we can do, like, once a month, you have the bedroom thing. But he goes, 'No, you're the girl. You can have it'. So, yeah, I'm lucky. But, yeah, it's tough.
Wing Kuang
But you are an influencer. I assume you work from home a lot. How could you work from home when you actually don't have a place to work from home?
Joanne
So I have a desk in my bedroom. My bedroom is quite large. I can put a desk there. He is actually a makeup artist, and he's also a content creator as well. So we've turned our dining room into a studio, and we work from there. So we don't have a dining room. We eat on the couch or on the floor.
Dennis Fang
So you've got a bit like a, what they call in the industry, an influencer house.
Joanne
Dennis Fang
Joanne
Yeah, that's a great term. Like it could be in the, I think in the LA, they call it like hype house or something. Joanne,
Dennis Fang
Joanne you are finally looking at buying your own home. What do you think triggered this?
Joanne
I definitely think it's pressure from my Asian parents, especially my mom, to purchase a house. She's always been saying, like, 'when you pay rent, you're paying someone else's mortgage. Like, you know. I'd rather you pay your own mortgage'. And she is very encouraging. She like similar to your situation, bank of mom and dad, my mom is very forthcoming about being able to support me. So I actually got my pre approval from the bank about a month ago, and I can and am ready to purchase. It's just me and my lack of, I guess, motivation to actually go out and look.
Wing Kuang
And Chris, your case is you and your partner are trying to build a family in the future, and that's why you go for a house. But is there any pressure from parents as well saying that, Oh, you two have been together for a long time, it's time to get a house of your own.
Christopher Tan
I think our scenario is actually sort of bit different from Joanne, because, well, my partner and I are the youngest in our family, both of us, she comes from a family of five. I come from a family of three, so everyone has left the nest in our family except us two. So I think for us, it's a bit different, because our parents know that we're the last ones left in our own homes, that they try and keep us for as long as we want. But ironically, because, you know, with everything we're at, with our careers and stuff, we really want to sort of lead and buy our own home.
Dennis Fang
Chris, do you think there's any like cultural reasons why you are choosing to buy a house, or you have chosen to buy a house.
Christopher Tan
Well I think it's just the independence. I mean, like, I feel like I don't know if I if I was back in Singapore, which is where I'm originally from, I feel like if I was living there, I probably wouldn't have been as pressured to pressured, as in from myself to move out. And that's because the housing property there is just obviously very different. It's all high rises, and you know, you'd sort of benefit a lot more by living with your parents, for example, whereas out here you have the great Australian dream, they say, the front yard, the backyard, your own home, and being able to drive and get to places, having a car ownership. So for us, it's like, it's obviously our family moved to Australia to have that better lifestyle. And as you grow up and get to that stage where you earning a good, a decent salary, where you have your own car, where, where you're sort of pretty well positioned your relationship as well, you want to take that next stage and buy a house. Is symbolic of, sort of the relationship, hitting that next, next stage.
Wing Kuang
When my parents came to visit me, as typical Cantonese older generation, one of the way they do sightseeing is to go to house inspection. But interestingly, they just don't have any interest in houses. They just keep looking at apartments. Because they were like, Yeah, apartment is modern, apartment is convenient, like, We love living close to the city. And then that's how I heard from my friends who were also looking for places that in Australia, like, if you buy a house, you actually own the land. And if you buy an apartment, then the land is actually getting divided and shared by people who live in the building. And this is when Dennis, you mentioned your story to me that your dad insists you buying a house rather than apartments because of the land.
Dennis Fang
Yes, and this is why I live so far away from work, because my dad and mom always told me that the number one investment that you can make is land, and there's no alternative. So even though I wanted to live in like Surrey Hills, some of where there's there's young people, and it's trendy, and there's events on my parents were like, No, you must live in Western Sydney. Have a big plot of land, maybe some horses. But we compromised and sort of lived in the near Parramatta, so less than very, very west Sydney. So that was a compromise.
Wing Kuang
Joanne, land, or being close to the city?
Joanne
Wing Kuang
Joanne
I think for me, I obviously prioritize lifestyle. I think my mental health is a lot better just not having to commute. I used to live with my parents. I understand what the commute like is like, but for my mom, she has a very similar mentality to your parents. So she is always like, get land. However, after looking at the prices in Sydney at the moment, she has kind of turned around and because she's kind of doing the shopping for me, she has been sending me links to apartments now. Like, she will always ask, like, is that a block of six, or is that a block of 40? The other thing she looks at is strata. So like strata, if it's expensive, if there's swimming pools, she's and that's an immediate no for my mom, because she's like, why are you paying strata such high fees, especially if you want to eventually rent it out. You're not going to live there. You You're it's coming out of your pocket.
Wing Kuang
My parents are completely different, like they were shocked by the Sydney's property prices, but they really insist looking at new apartments like
Dennis Fang
Wing Kuang
Yeah, even though I tell them, like, yeah, maybe actually new apartments are not that good, because we have had lots of reporting on the quality of these apartments. Then they were like, well, but there's, like, a modern lifestyle. If you just live in a block of four, like, the building's old and you have to maintain it, and you don't even have, like, good elevator.
Dennis Fang
Yeah, and have you guys heard of how much you actually need to earn to afford one of these places? Like in Perth, I think the figure was something close to 130 in Sydney. I think it was over $200,000 every single year. I mean, Chris, you obviously live with your partner. Is that how you're able to afford everything?
Christopher Tan
It's interesting, you mentioned that because I recently did a story with someone who worked in the fly-in-fly-out industry, so the mining industry, and that's the biggest employer in Western Australia, and it's a common perception is that people that work in that industry earn a lot of money. And so I've met this guy who was a single guy who was renting close to the city, close to the airport, and he tells me that he struggles with trying to buy a house. He reckons he is never going to ever be able to purchase a house, and that's because he's in the single income situation, whereas, for myself and my partner, being a door income, we're just getting by at this stage, but I can't even imagine, like, what we're paying now, but half in there.
Dennis Fang
And Joanne, do you think if you weren't having money from Mom and Dad, how would your situation be like,affording a place in Sydney where you are expected to turn over 200 grand every single year to afford?
Joanne
I think I would likely look interstate, so maybe Brisbane, or even Melbourne. I think the property prices are a lot more affordable, but my mum likes Sydney. She wants me to have a property here, especially the first one. So gotta do what mom says if I'm using her money, you know? Oh
Dennis Fang
yes. In our first episode, one of our guests talked about how they chose to live particularly close to their parents so they can still have the family community, the family support system. Is that something you're also looking for?
Joanne
Not necessarily for me, I think I'm into more of like a reinvesting mindset. I potentially, if I purchased something in Sydney, would live there for six months and then rent it out.
Wing Kuang
Joanne
Wing Kuang
How about you, Chris? Like you are now in Perth. Like, is it part of your plan that you end up moving back to that family circle, especially if you plan to start a family?
Christopher Tan
that's always a thing, actually brought up in Asian cultures is how far or how close do you move away from your parents? And it's interesting, being the last kid I had the luxury of seeing what my sisters did, so I can make up my own mind. And interestingly enough, my second sister decided to build just about one or two roundabouts across from my parents place. I was still in the same suburb, just like she obviously thought that she would get, you know, her privacy being away from for mom and dad. But every second day, like you know that that privacy sort of gets pretty blurred that line. And obviously I saw that unfold, you know, in the months, in the years and and decided for myself that I wanted to get far away enough where they can't sort of just pop by the same day or the next day, but close enough that they can just sort of come over for dinner or whatever, and if they ever want to come visit.
Wing Kuang
Especially when you don't want to cook that night, you can just ring your parents and say that, hey, can you, like, put an extra chopstick on the table and I can have the dinner.
Christopher Tan
Well we're actually going over tonight.
Wing Kuang
There's this really strong stereotype about people living in the West that they just don't want to buy houses, like they all just want to rent, because there's a part of the individualism that's part of the freedom they want. I thought that that would be my life as well after I moved to Australia. But then the long immigration process, the longer it was, the stronger desire I have to buy my own place. I'm seeing these phenomenon in a lot of my first-generation migrant friends, especially women who are approaching their 30. Joanne, like you are born in Australia, did you notice something similar, like among your female friends circle?
Joanne
I think among my Australian born Chinese friends, they still have the mentality where purchasing property is important. A lot of my friends actually have purchased property. And way ahead in a journey, they own, like three to four properties, whereas amongst my Caucasian Australian friends, not so much. They are very much, you know, we they live in the east, they rent. They're not really thinking about purchasing houses at the moment, yeah.
Wing Kuang
Do you feel that they are prioritizing getting a house then getting a partner?
Joanne
Oh that's an interesting question. I'm not sure about partner. I don't think it's a correlation. I feel like, you know, some breakups are breakups, like they just happen, but I do think a lot of them are trying to get married first before purchasing property together.
Dennis Fang
Oh, that's interesting, because my parents came from Shanghai, and one of the things in that culture is you first need to buy a house, and then you can possibly get married afterwards. It's especially important for guys, because allegedly, what I hear from my parents at least when women are looking for potential husbands, they first need to make sure, have they got a house? Have they got a car, preferably a Tesla or something like that. And then after you've ticked all those boxes, then you become eligible for marriage. Is that something you guys have heard of?
Wing Kuang
Especially you, Chris, now you just got your new house with your partner.
Dennis Fang
Your partner demand that you had a house faster than you could get married?
Christopher Tan
I don't feel like it was a demand. I feel like that was my personal responsibility. I felt like that's what I wanted to achieve first. And I felt like that would have built the foundations, you know, rather than getting married, having kids and then going back to mum and dads, for example, and then trying to figure out that, you know, co relationships, or the situation when you were already married, for example, whereas, you know, sharing a house together, you're doing life sort of together, you know, a lot of things, and it's just so much, it's just so much easier in that way. That was just my sort of understanding of the foundations of how I wanted to, yeah, to get by.
Dennis Fang
So it does seem like at least second-generation Chinese people have kind of lost that mentality somewhat and have adopted the Western ideologies of individualism. Is that what you guys are feeling?
Joanne
I think it's not so much that I feel like maybe in the Chinese culture there's a lot of emphasis on stability, especially back then in the war times, it's a lot about, you know, like, just put your head down and get to work, and just as long as you can feed your family, then we're good. Whereas now we have the privilege to think bigger, like, it's not just survival mode anymore, especially in the Western world, like we have the privilege to think, Okay, what else is there beyond just working a nine to five, buying a house, having a car, getting married, having babies, like what I don't want to be trapped in that social dynamic of this is what you have to take off. And a lot of people get into that mindset. They take off everything, and then they're like, Wait, hang on. Why am I still not happy? I thought all these things will make me happy, but I think searching for your own, and this is getting really deep, but like, yeah, I guess, like, there's more to life than you know, ticking off the traditional boxes of what society expects of you.
Christopher Tan
Well I think it's interesting, because I had the understanding from my parents that They would have expected me to get married first, then get a house, then, you know, have kids after that, because that was the route that they took. And then they really struggled to save together, to try and buy a house and have kids and and do that, whereas I feel like in this position that I've been that I currently am, where we've already, you know, bought a house together, and now we're saving, and now we're sending, you know, at our own terms, if we want to get a new car, for example, we wanted to get some some furniture. We're saving, you know, 5050, and we're putting it together and saving at our in terms so we don't struggle. And I think that's also a privilege of being the youngest and the only and the only boy as well. Yeah, it's been really good in terms of just taking our time and having our own timelines that we want to achieve.
Wing Kuang
Now change the topic. Australian media love headline showcasing how rich Chinese people are, especially in the property markets. And most of the time they will refer this as like the rich overseas Chinese. I'm not rich. I'm definitely not rich. But how do you guys feel when we contribute to the headline about the property market?
Joanne
Sometimes I tell people I'm Malaysian. I don't say I'm Malaysian Chinese, just because of that stereotype.
Dennis Fang
How's the stereotypes different?
Joanne
people talk about the Rich Asians. It's usually from mainland China, and I've only been to China once. Even though my blood is Chinese, I can't really relate to anything mainland China, but I relate so much to Malaysia because I grew up there. I like the food, I speak, the language, you know, the culture I understand. So think it's like a kind of like, similar to how they say you choose your friends, not your family, kind of a little bit like, I don't feel connected to China at all.
Wing Kuang
And how about you, Chris, when you are reading those headline as a reader, but also as a journalist?
Christopher Tan
It's interesting, I guess that that move just to reference that you know what you're asking the movie Crazy Rich Asians, doesn't also help in that, in that scenario, and it's interesting, you mentioned that because, as I was mentioning earlier in the program, I'm from Singapore. A lot of a lot of my friends that get to know me over time, they're like, Oh, you're from Singapore. You moved here, so you must be rich. But it's, it's not. Not quite the it's not quite the case. We like, yes, of course, we took the plane, we came over, but my parents worked really hard in Singapore to make sure we could have a life in Australia. But it's not the classic. Oh, you own a car in Singapore. You must be rich, sort of stereotype.
Dennis Fang
I do love that film, though, especially the Coldplay cover at the end. So there was this statistic from a few years ago from the Westpac Ipsos research, I believe. And it basically said that Asian Australians were much more likely to believe that their parents should share their generational wealth in the form of basically helping their children afford houses. I think the statistic was 60% versus 39% of Australians in general. What do you guys think about that? Does that sound about right?
Joanne
I did expect my parents to kind of support me in terms of housing and like, you know, the groceries and stuff, but not so much actually, physically giving me cash. I've never, like asked for money from my parents. I've always kind of lived within my means. I think experiences or stories from my Caucasian Australian friends, they are parents kicking them out when they're 18, or they're expected to kind of like fend for themselves when as soon as they start working. So I do think the mindset there is slightly different. Yes, I feel
Christopher Tan
like, from my experience, my parents growing up in Australia, they like, like, a lot of the times when I got when I was in primary school, a lot of my friends, my Australian Anglo friends, would go to the canteen, and they would be able to purchase stuff, whereas I had always had the home cooked food for lunch. And from a very young age, my parents would give me very little pocket money. And growing up, even, you know, you did ask for toys, you asked for nice, shiny kings, but they resist giving that. And I think that sort of paid off today, because I understand the value of saving my other friends that you know were given so much. And in saying that as well, my parents, they're not well off, but they're not, you know, they work hard, so they're not poor either. And the money that they keep aside from me, for example, in my scenario, was going towards my university fees, for example. So even though, when I was at a young age, I would not get all the shiny, nice toys and all that, all that money that they saved up, you know, even the red packets and all that they keep aside for me, all that money has gone towards a fund that has today paid off for my HECS, which, in theory, now during the process of buying a property, that's one factor that has allowed the bank to process me even better. Because, yeah, I don't have finances, don't have hacks, I don't have all those things that sort of weigh me down.
Dennis Fang
It does seem like that The Great Australian Dream of having a house with a front yard, a backyard, a family white picket fence seems to be quite dead in just my anecdotal experience, but among Chinese people, particularly my parents, I think they've really bought into it, and they still really believe in it, and they have, somewhat, in my experience, At least sense that dream to their children as well. So me and my brother, what do you guys think about that?
Joanne
Oh yeah, my mom definitely subscribes to that.
Wing Kuang
That's why the land is important.
Joanne
Yes, that's why she wants land.
Dennis Fang
Joanne
Oh, she doesn't really care about the fake fence. But yeah, my mom definitely still subscribes to that mentality,
Christopher Tan
If I could raise the fact of, I guess, cultural significance in that question, I feel like, yeah, my parents and even my partner's parents like us to have property with front and backyard and all that massive space, mainly because then we can host family for dinner, for reunion, dinner for Christmas and all those sort of things. And in a sense, as well, because we're hosting and other family and friends are coming in a way that, as you probably understand as well, our parents love to brag about our kids having homes and being able to have all the family together. So I feel like that's that there's that value in why they want that to happen, and it makes them proud. And I guess it makes us proud as well when we can host. And it's not just mum and dads all the time, but we all know like mum and dad, when we try and host, they always say, oh, let's just just come over. We'll prep and we'll cook.
Wing Kuang
From our conversation. There are just so much about this idea of having your own place and buying up your own property for our community. It goes beyond the symbol of being successful, but it's also about security and the sense of belonging as a migrant. But the housing market right now in Australia is so bad for young people. What does that mean to young Chinese Australians who are now looking at the market?
Christopher Tan
I mean, I can only speak from my experience, but I feel like just through my journey, yes, it is. The market is is crazy. It's very difficult, both rental and buying, and this is also partly the media responsibility in playing this up. But I feel like if you if you just keep saving, if you just keep saving and keep saving and keep having a goal. I know that gold keeps getting pushed up by the market prices, but if you keep saving, you can get there one day, whether if it's with a partner or by yourself, maybe that timeline won't be as realistic anymore. But I feel like, just with my sort of Asian sort of mentality, I feel like, if you just keep working, if you keep working harder to save, cut more costs, I feel like one day you will get in
Wing Kuang
And how about you, Joanne?
Joanne
I think at the moment, a smart way to do it is to kind of diversify your income, the down payment that you're putting towards a house. There are some discussions about whether or not that will eventually get a better ROI than actually just putting it into a Vanguard Index Fund. So I think a lot of young people are starting to do that now at the same time, yes, eventually we will purchase houses, but the age where you purchase a house is getting later and later, and that shares a bit more of a more favorable way of investment at the moment.
Wing Kuang
Our question for this podcast is, can our 'rich Chinese parents' do help us get into the property market? What is your answer, Joanne?
Joanne
I think yes. Unfortunately, my mom is looking to sell her properties overseas just to help me purchase a house here. So and they are living so frugally, they don't go out like me. I eat out all the time. They go to Flemington market, and they buy a one kilogram of cucumber for $5 you know. So they're a lot better at saving and they're really worried that, you know, if they pass away, who's going to look after me? And they just want to feel safe knowing that I have a roof above my head, and no matter what I own the house, I'm not getting kicked out. I won't ever be on the streets struggling. So at the end of the day, it's just her love towards me and that, yeah, I appreciate that.
Christopher Tan
The main thing for me, or the main word for me, is drip fed, and I think that's from my experience. So what I mean by drip fed is you should still try and save as much money as you can by yourself, with your partner, or whoever it is, but when it gets to the point where you've put an offer when you're so close, and this is from our experience, when you're getting so close, you've got the offer, but you just need to put in a little bit more to get there. Then that's when your parents will come in, and that's why, that's what I mean by drip drip feeding is when your parents give you a little bit of money to help you pay for it, but always in mind that you'll pay them back at the end of the day. We want to pay them back, because we want to know that we own this house and we worked hard for it, and it makes you also value everything, literally everything around in this house, from the fridge to, you know, paint job, to everything that you paid for.
Dennis Fang
Thank you so much, guys. You've been listening to Chinese ish, an SBS podcast about what it's like to be young and Chinese in today's Australia. This episode is hosted by Wing Kuang and me Dennis Fang, and is produced by Bertin Huynh, with support from Joel Supple and Max Gosford. The artwork is by Joanna Hu.
Wing Kuang
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