A controversial ‘doomsday’ economist has urged Australians to sell their properties and other major assets ahead of what he predicts will be a global market crash, but believes Australia could eventually emerge as one of the world’s most attractive places to invest. 

Harry Dent Jr. has warned that Australian property prices could plunge by at least 20 per cent as a massive financial bubble bursts, triggering sharp falls in property, shares, gold, silver and AI-related stocks.

Despite many of his previous doomsday predictions failing to materialise, Dent insists the downturn has already begun. He claims Australia has the world’s second-largest property bubble, behind only China, and warns the housing market is heading for a major crash.

‘This bubble is going to burst because it’s not sustainable, and it’s not good for the economy. When real estate is this expensive it kills the very people that drive the economy; the biggest spending surge occurs in the lifecycle of consumers between ages 18-22 and 46-47.

‘If you have an 80 per cent mortgage and the price of your property goes down by 20 per cent, you’ve lost a huge amount of your equity… you are underwater on your most prized asset. This is serious business.’

Dent’s longstanding assertion has been that Australian real estate is overinflated due to a combination of government stimulus, such as tax breaks for investors, and empty dwellings constraining supply.

He warned that China’s property downturn, which has seen prices fall 25 per cent since their peak in 2021, was just the beginning of a much larger crash that would also be felt in Australia.

Controversial ‘doomsday’ economist Harry Dent Jr. has urged Australians to sell their homes, shares and other major assets ahead of what he predicts will be the ‘crash of our lifetime’. 

Dent warned Australian property prices could plunge by at least 20 per cent, while the share market could fall by as much as 60 per cent as a global ‘everything bubble’ bursts.

‘China’s going to see the biggest real estate bust in history. They have 22 per cent of their homes sitting empty, and no country could withstand that without the government controlling everything,’ he said.

‘Real estate will never be the same after this crash… all future growth is going to come from emerging countries.

‘The Australian stock market may go down 50-60 per cent in what I call the “crash of our lifetime” and, in real estate, you’re going to feel that stronger than anybody.’

Dent’s latest prediction has been met with scepticism, given his long history of making dire forecasts about the economy that have largely failed to materialise.

In 2024, ABC’s Media Watch questioned why Dent continued to attract attention despite his track record of inaccurate predictions, asking why he ‘continues to give hopelessly wrong predictions’.

However, with Australia’s real estate market down 5.2 per cent from its peak in March 2026, Dent said he was confident his predictions were proving accurate.

‘I’ve been proved right on a lag, but we still have to see follow-through… this is the greatest real estate bubble and the first fully global one in history,’ he said, adding that investors should make selling a priority.

‘If you have a holiday home, that’s the first thing I would sell.’

Horrified investors on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in 2008, as the Global Financial Crisis hit. 

Dent warns that even traditionally ‘safe’ investments like gold are now part caught up in an ‘everything’ bubble

Dent also warned that traditional ‘safe’ investments such as gold and silver were part of an ‘everything’ bubble, alongside rapidly booming AI stocks. The average Australian superannuation portfolio has approximately 12 per cent invested in AI-related companies.

‘This is where you can protect yourself; it’s not something to sit through. Economists will tell you to sit through corrections and normal recessions, but this is different. It’s an “everything” bubble with nowhere to hide.’

‘Gold and silver finally joined this “everything” bubble in the last three to four years; gold is as overvalued as anything, and I think it’s going to crash 50 – 60 per cent,’ he said. 

‘The AI stock bubble should have peaked around 2019/20, but it’s been extended which has made everything more overvalued.

‘This is the one time I would diverge from financial advisors … this is the time to sell everything you don’t need, especially in real estate.

‘The two things that might hold up best are apartment buildings and retirement homes…but if your young and own an apartment, I’d still sell it because you’re going to get a higher capital yield given what’s going to happen to the economy. 

‘Sell your holiday homes first, then your main home, then the apartment buildings.’ 

While Dent’s grim predictions might spark alarm bells for Australians, he was quick to point out that Australia had a ‘secret weapon’ that set it apart from other first-world economies: Asian immigrants. 

Sydney CBD’s ‘China Town’ – a favoured food haunt for locals, and a result of what Dent call’s Australia’s ‘secret weapon’ – Asian immigrants

The main passenger terminal at Suvarnabhumi Airport, Bangkok. Australia’s Thai immigrant community jumped by 61 per cent between 2010-2020

‘You have the best immigrants in the world with people coming from Asia; no-one complains about Asian immigrants – they’re Australia’s secret weapon,’ he said.

Dent was particularly upbeat about the place of immigration in Australia in the face of a declining birth rate.

‘If I looked at Australia’s spending wave chart, I would think it was an emerging country – that’s how good the demographics are there; no other country in the developed world has demographics like that.’

Dent pointed to India and southeast Asia as key investment markets for Australians in the future and named Perth his number one city for investors due to proximity to emerging markets. 

‘The two places in the world that I would invest after the crash is in southeast Asia and India – which is on your front porch,’ he said. 

‘Perth would be the number one city I would favor for real estate after this downturn because it’s in the best position to benefit from those growth markets.

‘Australia’s my number one pick of the developed countries and India and southeast Asia are my number one picks in the emerging world; Australia couldn’t be in a better place to invest in that part of the world.’

As for now, Dent’s advice for investors is to secure their cash in government bonds and wait it out. 

Dent said Perth was his ‘number one pick’ for cities that will benefit from what he believes is a looming economic catastrophe for the global economy

Australian government bonds are where an investor loans the government money in exchange for regular interest payments, as well as a payout when the loan matures.  

‘The best thing to do is invest in the twenty-year government bonds in Australia. That’s the safe haven,’ Dent said.

‘As for buying a property – wait. It’s going to pay to wait more than any time in history.

All the government stimulus has created a bubble so big I can’t compare it to the bubble that preceded the Great Depression of 1929, or the bubble of 1992-2000. Those are the previous two biggest bubbles, but this has gone for 17 years and its gone global.

‘This is the time people should listen to an outsider like me.’