Who will regulate News Corp’s move into mortgage lending?

If you want to advertise a house online in Australia, You have no choice. Only two companies dominate the market.

Realestate.com.AU, the largest property lists of Australia, belongs to the Digital Media Company Rea Group, the majority of the majority of Rupert Murdoch’s US -based Media Holding News Corporation.

Rea average traffic 11.9 million viewers per monthHis closest competitor is much more than the domain name.

This is Rea’s dominant market power and now ongoing probe Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

Meanwhile, My research He has shown that Rea has expanded to mortgage loans, a new aspect that has attracted attention so far.

The results here are worth considering. News Corp, a foreign media company, now has a direct share in frameworking Australia housing narrative and the policy that influences, while the property platform uses lists, data and its own mortgages through the platform.

This is a cunning business strategy. However, Australia currently does not have an appropriate regulator to control such a hybrid being and asks serious questions about who is watching.

‘Good debt’

The Australian households have long been a long time, and the reigning narrative, which has been encouraged by the media, was a “way to reserve”. The increasing gap between mortgages, flat wages and increasing housing prices has been approved as the way of the director.

In this way, many households have come to embrace as a form that desires mortgages ”good debt”Is a sign of an understanding player rather than a long -term financial load.

This has helped the fuel of what can be defined as a housing “madness – – a variable situation in which increasing housing prices and indebtedness weaken home welfare. Young generations and disadvantaged are left in the cold as well as others.

From newspapers to platforms and financing

Digitalization broke the financial industry by opening out of bank players, as it forced old media players such as News Corp to look for new strategies to stay alive.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Rea Group entered the mortgage market in 2016. Partnership with National Australia Bank. The following year he bought mortgage intermediaries.

Realestate.com.au platform was later redesigned to include a mortgage portal to direct millions of Australia home seekers to lend through these channels. This provides front and follow -up mortgage commissions from the Bank and the brokers, which are caused by the revenue from the Platform.

The Rea also harvests the comprehensive financial data provided by millions of users financial profiles and calculator tools embedded on the website.

These data can make money through an increasingly valuable asset, the platform’s advertiser and homeowners markets and News Corp’s. Comprehensive partnerships with data broker and analytical companies.

Sell ​​a mortgage

Most recently, Rea Group took the finance strategy one step further. In October 2024, 19.9 % purchased Athena home loans, which lends out of the digital bank.

This allows direct profit from its own mortgages offered to platform users through the current intermediary, mortgage selection.

For Rea Group (and owner News Corp), this movement is both logical and strategically challenging in a challenging media environment. In addition to influencing politics, Rea Group and News Corp are competent to prepare and cross a powerful message about shelter and debt.

The purchase of Athena – athena’s acquisition of the housing mortgage market – and therefore more dependent on the debt of customers can strengthen Rea’s interest in housing prices and the indebtedness of households. This has the potential to weaken policies to improve housing.

The law cannot continue

Power imbalance against consumers is sharp. So which regulator ignores him?

Such an attempt that combines housing, finance and the media may shift from the narrow -oriented legislation from the cracks in the fragmented regulatory system of Australia.

The legislation is also behind technology. A platform convincing design – Algorithmic tools, predetermined paths and data collection – hide the priority of consumers to commercial interests.

Players from different industries that interact with a platform “Black Box” seem to be under the supervision of a more loose regulatory regulatory from a single industry or out of a platform.

One ACCC representative accepted:

Legislation is not updated to keep up with developing technology, trends and developing markets.

In a landscape in which such complex digital initiatives become norms, regulators need to update their understanding and expand to include judicial powers.

And not just in Australia. Rea approved The success of the initiative here will lead to a presentation on the wide global property platform network.

This strategy is not only unique to Rea. Other companies are watching this area. Rea’s closest rival Domain has currently purchased by Costar, a major digital real estate player in the United States to challenge Rea.

Fast and great interruptions caused by such initiatives Airbnb’s negative impact Globally, on the purchase of housing can be difficult to correct backwards.

Someone needs to continue watching.

Rea Group refused to comment on this article.

This re -published Speech.