Super fund home lending ends on 10 August: buyer's agents brace

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Kooky

Builder of Shaka, the payment router that pays every agent their commission on closing date.

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Self-managed superannuation funds lose the ability to take out new loans for residential property on Monday 10 August 2026, and the part of the buyer's agent profession that grew up around those purchases is preparing for a hard landing. Real Estate Business reported on 7 August that agencies which specialised in buying for super funds expect a severe drop in work, citing a veteran buyer's agent who said businesses were already going under.

The same report carried two sets of figures that show the size of what is ending. The Australian Finance Industry Association counted 16,000 new residential loans to self-managed funds in the 2026 financial year, worth $10.3 billion. And research by the comparison site Money.com.au found that many of the investors affected intend to keep buying property by another route. For buyer's agents, in Queensland as elsewhere, the question is less whether these clients disappear than how they come back.

Australian Finance Industry Association figures for the 2026 financial year, as reported by Real Estate Business, 7 August 2026.

What ends on Monday

A self-managed super fund is a small fund whose members are also its trustees. Until now such a fund has been able to borrow to buy a single asset, including a house or a unit, under what is called a limited recourse borrowing arrangement. The loan is secured only against the property bought, so that if the fund defaults the lender cannot reach the fund's other assets.

The ban on new arrangements for residential property was added to the negative gearing and capital gains tax package that Parliament passed on 25 June. It takes effect 45 days after the legislation received royal assent on 26 June, which is 10 August. As reported when the package passed, loans already in place are not affected. A fund can still buy residential property outright with money it already holds, and the restriction concerns housing, not commercial premises.

The practical effect is on funds with a moderate balance. A fund holding a few hundred thousand dollars could, with a loan, buy an investment home. Without one, it generally cannot, because the balance alone does not cover the price.

How large the niche had become

The figures from the Australian Finance Industry Association suggest the activity was much bigger than official estimates had allowed for. Its count of 16,000 new residential loans in the 2026 financial year was four times the Australian Taxation Office's annual estimate of 4,000, Real Estate Business reported.

Dividing the $10.3 billion by the 16,000 loans gives an average of about $644,000 a loan. That is the scale of an ordinary investment property, not of a prestige purchase, which fits the picture of funds with moderate balances buying one dwelling each.

Not everyone accepts that the segment was large in relative terms. When the package passed in June, Smart Property Investment reported the chair of Property Investment Professionals of Australia, Cate Bakos, as putting lending inside self-managed funds at about 1 per cent of the residential market. The two descriptions are compatible. A slice that is small beside the whole housing market can still be most of the business of the firms that specialise in it.

Why some buyer's agents are exposed

The exposure comes from specialisation. Real Estate Business reports that the agencies facing the greatest disruption are those that relied heavily on super fund clients. For a firm of that kind the fund purchase was not one service among several. It was most of the business, and the client it was built to serve, a household with super savings but limited capacity to borrow in its own name, is the one the ban removes.

Simon Loo, founder of the buyer's agency House Finder, told Real Estate Business that the effect was already visible. "The shake-up I think is going to be very real," he said, adding that agencies which had typically targeted fund buyers stood to be hit hardest.

The weeks before the deadline produced the opposite of a slowdown. In July, The Adviser reported that some buyer's agents were urging clients to buy before 10 August. A rush of that kind brings forward work that would otherwise have been spread across the following year, which makes the period after the deadline quieter still.

Agencies with a broad client base are in a different position. A firm that buys mainly for owner-occupiers, or for investors purchasing in their own names, loses one category of enquiry and keeps the rest.

What fund trustees say they will do

The research cited by Real Estate Business, carried out by Money.com.au, asked investors what they intend to do now. The report does not give the sample size or the survey dates, so the percentages are best read as an indication of direction.

Each of the three paths still involves a property purchase, and so potentially a buyer's agent, but none is the same engagement as before. A purchase outside super is made in a personal name, a company or a trust, with ordinary lending. A commercial purchase through a fund is a different asset class with different leases, valuations and risks. A purchase outright inside the fund needs a much larger balance.

One further figure concerns people who do not have a fund. Of that group, 82 per cent said they no longer see value in setting one up if it cannot borrow for residential property. For agencies that relied on a steady flow of newly established funds, that is the number that matters most.

The licence covers property, not super

The episode has drawn attention to a boundary that Queensland's licensing rules draw quite clearly.

A real estate agent licence, according to the Office of Fair Trading, authorises the holder to buy, sell, exchange or rent property and to negotiate on behalf of buyers, sellers or landlords. That is the whole of it. A buyer's agent is licensed to find and negotiate a property for a client who has decided to buy.

Whether a person should establish a super fund, move retirement savings into it or use it to hold property is a different kind of question. It concerns a financial product. Moneysmart, the consumer site of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, says only a financial adviser who holds an Australian financial services licence, or is authorised by a licensee, can give advice about a self-managed super fund. A Queensland real estate licence does not extend to it.

The state's conduct rules add a duty that applies whatever structure a client buys through. Section 22 of the Property Occupations Regulation 2014 requires an agent to act in accordance with the client's instructions, and section 18 bars an agent from accepting an appointment where the agent's interests conflict with the client's. An agent whose income depends on a client completing a purchase before a deadline has an interest in the timing. The written appointment, which must set out all fees and when they fall due, is where a client can see how strongly.

What it means for purchases in Queensland

For purchases in Queensland the change shifts who the buyer is on paper more than whether a purchase happens.

A fund that bought with a loan before the deadline keeps that loan. A client who was planning a fund purchase and missed the date has the options the survey describes. If they buy in their own name or through a trust or company instead, the appointment of a buyer's agent is made by that buyer, and the rules are the ordinary ones: a written appointment on Form 6 before any work is done, stating the services and every fee.

An appointment signed with a fund's trustees for a purchase that can no longer be financed raises its own question, which is what happens to any engagement fee already paid. The Queensland Government's guidance says an appointment can be ended on 30 days' notice, or sooner by agreement, and that the terms of the appointment govern what remains payable. That is a matter between each client and agency under the document they signed.

What comes next

The deadline itself is the first marker. From 10 August, no new arrangement of this kind can begin for housing.

The second will be the lending figures. If the finance industry's count of 16,000 loans in a year is right, a fall in new loans to self-managed funds would be expected to show in lending data for the months after the deadline. The third is slower: how many of the specialist agencies adapt to buying for clients outside super, how many merge, and how many close. Mr Loo's remark that businesses are already going down suggests that process has begun.

The buyer's agent profession is in a year of adjustment on several fronts, with the collapse of a large investment-focused agency in May still working through liquidation and industry bodies pressing for tighter licensing. The end of super fund lending adds a commercial test to the regulatory one. The work that remains is the work the licence was written for: acting for a buyer, on written terms, to find and negotiate a property.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Queensland Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for Queensland property professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

About Kooky and Shaka →