Greens deputy leader Mehreen Faruqi is set to make a windfall of $850,000 from the upcoming sale of properties from her multi-million-dollar housing portfolio.
The New South Wales senator, who with her party is openly critical of government policies that support “wealthy property investors”, appears to be a pretty savvy investor.
Property records show Ms Faruqi, who has criticised Australia’s lack of housing affordability, is selling a property in Port Macquarie on the New South Wales mid-north coast with a guide price of between $1 million and $1.1 million.
She and her husband bought the four-bedroom home for $250,000 in 2001. It went on the market in May, creating the opportunity for a sizable six-figure profit.
Faruqi also earns $750 a week for a three-bedroom house he rents in Beaconsfield, in Sydney’s south-central suburbs. He paid just $193,000 for the property in 1996.
He also owns a 500-square-metre plot of land in Lahore, a city in northern Pakistan, as well as a four-bedroom residential property in an inner-city suburb of Sydney, where the average property value is $2.5 million. That house was purchased for an undisclosed sum in 2007.
Ms Faruqi’s property portfolio has been criticised by conservative lobby group Advance Australia, which labelled her “just another politician, riding high on the housing affordability crisis while doing nothing about it and amassing a fortune”.
Ms Faruqi recently described Australia’s housing system as one in which “millions of people are left behind while banks and property developers profit off the misery of others”.
New South Wales Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi is pictured during Question Time in Parliament on July 1.
Senator Faruqi criticised the Albanian government’s solution to the housing crisis last week in an Instagram post (pictured)
He has previously criticised government support for “wealthy property investors”, in line with the Greens’ policy of scrapping negative gearing and capital gains tax breaks.
Ms Faruqi did not always plan to sell her Port Macquarie retreat for a tidy profit. She had originally submitted a development proposal to Port Macquarie Hastings Council in May 2023 to subdivide her investment property into three and build two-storey townhouses on the land.
The ambitious plan involved felling 20 trees in prime koala habitat. An ecological report submitted to the council said the plans would “result in the loss of the majority of the vegetation on the site” near Lighthouse Beach.
The senator has previously criticised previous state governments that allowed the clearing of native forests and the destruction of koala habitats.
She received criticism for the development proposal and appears to have scrapped the plan altogether a year later, putting the property on the market.
Mehreen Faruqi sells her Port Macquarie investment property for $1.1 million (pictured)
He bought the property for $250,000 in 2001, and if he sold it at the asking price, he would pocket an additional $850,000.
Sandra Bourke, a spokeswoman for conservative lobby group Advance, told the Daily Mail Australia: “I can’t remember the last time I heard the Greens talk about the environment. That’s because they’re not who they used to be.
‘It used to be about protecting the forests, now it’s about them.’
Daily Mail Australia has contacted Ms Faruqi for comment.
According to the Greens’ website, “Safe and affordable housing is essential to living with dignity. In a wealthy country like Australia, no one should be forced to do without it.”
‘However, renters and mortgage holders are suffering. Big banks and wealthy property investors are making billions of dollars, while millions of Australians struggle to keep a roof over their heads.’
The Greens’ housing affordability proposal would cap rent at 25 percent of a tenant’s income and end capital gains tax breaks and negative gearing.
The New South Wales senator came under fire on Sunday after appearing on ABC’s Insiders when she refused to say whether she believes the Islamic terror group Hamas should be dismantled.
Ms Faruqi also owns an investment property in Beaconsfield, in Sydney’s inner-west (pictured)
She rents the property for $750 a week, which is about 40 per cent of the average salary in New South Wales (property pictured)
He was asked five times whether he believed the extremist group responsible for the deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israeli festival-goers should be abolished as a condition for the creation of a Palestinian state.
“Hamas has nothing to do with recognising the Palestinian state,” he told host David Speers.
‘Recognizing the Palestinian state means that Palestinians can achieve self-determination.’
Asked further on the issue, the senator said: “I cannot repeat it again and again, (Hamas) has nothing to do with the Palestinian state.”
‘The Palestinians need to decide where they want to go with their own region, not with the intervention of Western countries.’
Speers noted that Hamas was listed as a terrorist organisation in Australia and told the senator: “Surely you can say whether you would like to see them go or not.”
She replied: “It’s not up to me to say who should go and who shouldn’t.”
Ms Faruqi said she could not answer the question because it was based on a “hypothetical situation” if the Palestinians were granted statehood.