Banner-wavers need not be hysterical, as an Aldi is not going to de-value house prices: Terry Ryder

I keep a file of events claimed by banner-wavers to destroy property values, and I thought I had a complete list.

But a new one has popped up on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast: construction of an Aldi supermarket.

This one has me even more baffled than the other items on the list of value destroyers. There is no research evidence that having an Aldi in your neighbourhood decimates house prices – indeed, the quick exercise I did this morning indicates the opposite.

But this phenomenon of residents bellowing outrage over their property values being destroyed by all manner of things is becoming quite bizarre.

The broad list of resident evils includes development of townhouses in the street. A retirement village down the road. A Buddhist temple (aren’t they the terrorist people?). A detox centre in the suburb (maybe that one has some validity). A refugee processing facility outside the town. Mining somewhere in the region. An NBN transmission tower on the horizon.

Seaweed washed up on the local beach is deemed to de-value million-dollar waterfront homes.

Wind farms are a great favourite among the hysterical. The list of disasters deemed likely to flow from the presence of wind turbines (including cows unable to give milk and chickens refusing to lay) is annihilation of property values for any home with a distant turbine view.

And few things create a neighbourhood meltdown like plans for a mosque.

It’s an issue I’ve followed for years and here’s the thing: none of the people protesting about their property values being hurt by these and other “nasties” ever produce any research evidence to show that their concerns have some foundation.

This is, I’m sure, because the research doesn’t support them. Often it shows the opposite.

Lakemba has the largest mosque in Australia in its midst, and it has averaged 8.5% in annual growth in its median house price in the past three years, one of the best results in Sydney. The suburb’s median unit price has done even better, averaging 10% per year growth over the past three years and 8% per year average growth over the past five years.

But facts are a minor annoyance to people who get a bee in their bonnets about something deemed undesirable for their locale.