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Mark Donaldson VC has urged young Defence Force members to consider property investment early in their careers to set themselves up for financial success, encouraging them not to see home ownership as a burden – but as a tool to unlock financial freedom.
Donaldson, a former SAS trooper and Victoria Cross recipient, joined the Australian Army in 2002 with a singular goal: to serve in the Special Air Service Regiment. His journey took him from Kapooka to Singleton, Townsville, and finally to Perth. That career taught him to manage risk in high-stakes environments – a skill that has served him in civilian life.
In an episode of the Defence Property Podcast, from REB’s sister title Defence Connect, Donaldson joined host Kane Dury to explore how property investment can create long-term financial stability for serving members of the Australian Defence Force, particularly when utilising tools such as the Defence Home Ownership Assistance Scheme (DHOAS) and Home Purchase Assistance (HPA).
“Hindsight’s perfect,” Donaldson told Dury. “But, my appetite back then [towards investing] was probably not very high. However, if I was to tell anyone in the military, or in that sort of similar situation, take a risk to do that now.”
Donaldson, now a property investor himself, urged ADF members to reframe their mindset, seeing property not as a burden, but as an asset that sets them up for future success.
“It seems very risky,” he said. “Sometimes for me, it was like, hey, this will tie me down … I’ll be forced to be locked into a certain thing to pay this off [but] that’s not a bad thing.”
“You’ve got to think about it now as an asset. It’s there to be utilised in the future.”
This asset will help young Defence Force members achieve financial freedom in the future through a tangible store of value. Though, he left listeners with a blunt but motivating message: “If you still want to be running around in a green uniform when you’re 55, 60, you know, keep going to the casino.”
Despite the encouragement, he acknowledged that buying a property is not a simple process. He recalled the often overwhelming, time-consuming, and frustrating process of searching for and purchasing a property.
“It became a cost-time benefit for us. Every weekend was spent trawling houses … at auctions … every weekend was spent missing out,” he said. “We didn’t know the area that well … it was a good decision for the family and financially it was a good decision, but we didn’t know it well enough.”
His advice: “Seek out people who have done it before and learn from them … as you do with everything in the military.”
Dury, who purchased his first property at 22 after a chance encounter with a property investment book in a Townsville shopping centre, echoed the sentiment that the earlier ADF members start investing, the better.
“I guess the thing that makes me so passionate is giving the young person that light bulb moment of starting, you know, younger and sooner,” he said. “Because time is the one asset we can’t get back and time does all the heavy lifting if done right with property.”
The podcast also unpacked a data-driven approach to building property portfolios, focusing on affordability indices, supply and demand metrics, and avoiding oversupplied areas such as those targeted by groups selling off-the-plan developments.
“There’s so much out there at the moment,” Dury said. “We want consistent data without high variance so it’s reliable … low stock environment, low building approvals, that’s critical because that’s additional new supply.”
The Defence Property Podcast is hosted by Kane Dury, founder of Discover Buyers Agents, and Liam Garman, managing editor at Momentum Media, and explores financial literacy and investment opportunities tailored for members of the Australian Defence Force.
If you would like to listen to the latest episode, click here.
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