Should I own my Home before purchasing investment properties?

Hi,
Welcome to the forum.
I am in a similar predicament .
Although I do not own my own home I can't advise you on selling your investment property but want to point out a few things.

Are you claiming depreciation on the investment property get a quantity surveyor to assess the property.

You may need to fix your interest rate or sell , you can't do both once fixed you pay break fees to break the fixed loan.

Are you claiming negative gearing at the end of financial year, you can claim it weekly with a tax variation form. Helps with cash flow.

If you sell a joint owned investment property and make a capital gain the capital gain will be deemed income for the parent claiming parenting payments if in the same financial year or could also be added to partners other incomein same financial year  for a nice tax bill at the end of financial year !

If you sell and decide later to borrow money you will get a shock when the bank lowers the amount you can borrow due to reduced incomes.

Is the investment loan interest only as if it is not you could change it and put the extra savings in repayments into the non tax deductible home loan.

look into an offset account linked to your non tax deductible home loan and have your salary paid into it. This reduces your interest on your home loan. Yes it may be a couple of days but it makes a small difference , that over a longer period of time adds up.

Warning you must be very good an not blowing out a credit card to do this!
If you have a high level of financial spending will power pay your normal expenses on an interest free credit card and pay it off from the funds sitting in the offset account before the interest free period runs out in usually 55 days or maybe every 30 days paying out the balance would be safer.
Warning you must be very good an not blowing out a credit card to do this!

When you go to get family payments your negative gearing will be added to your tax assessable income to deem your income for payment allowance assessment. See my entry in opinionated for more information on this caper.

If your combined incomes are low enough and the parent at home does 15 hours in their business or in training or in a part time job they may be elligible for Child Care Benefit.

Five years ago having two children at the same time and being unemployed out of University (Had to be House Dad)
I had two investment properties and analyzed my cash flow over the next 5 years. I decided to sell the negative geared property and keep my positive geared property. I estimate that I have lost $70,000 in capital gain over five years from doing that but I can sleep at night and can deal with centre link's bureaucracy  and the family office bureaucracy as I am not making a negative loss which is deemed as income to them !
Unfortunately and frustratingly I can not get a loan to buy more property as our total income is not enough to borrow more than $70,000 even though my equity is about $200,000.
However there is a glimmer of light at the end of the parent tunnel in that my two kids are starting school in 2010.
So I can either try and get a job even though this has been a hard and impossible task over the last five years or run my own business full time ,which I have been doing on a part time basis for the last 2 years.

My thoughts are with you as you navigate this unsupported minefield know as being a mum and dad investor. Remember it is only for five years and try and cherish the time with your kids at this age as the 5 years will go so quickly for you !