What an SMSF can still buy, and what it can't.

Outright, yes - a fund can still buy residential property using its own money. What ended on 10 August 2026 is borrowing to do it: a new limited recourse borrowing arrangement can only be used to acquire business real property. So the strategy of putting a small deposit down and gearing the rest into a residential investment inside super is no longer available for new arrangements.

New limited recourse borrowing arrangements were restricted to business real property. Where an LRBA is entered into on or after that date to acquire real property, the property must be business real property at the time the arrangement is entered into - meaning real estate used wholly and exclusively in one or more businesses. Residential property no longer qualifies for new borrowing.

Nothing. Arrangements entered into before 10 August 2026 continue on their terms and can still be refinanced, including residential ones. If you exchanged a binding contract to acquire the property before that date, you are also unaffected even if the purchase settles, or the loan is written, afterwards. If you are mid-process, the exchange date is the one that decides it - which is worth checking rather than assuming.

Real estate used wholly and exclusively in one or more businesses. The test is about use, not about zoning or what the title says - a property zoned commercial but sitting empty is not automatically business real property, and the test is applied when the arrangement is entered into. The common case is a business owner's own premises: a warehouse, a workshop, a professional suite. Because the consequences of getting it wrong are real, this gets checked before a lender sees the file.

Yes, and this is the exception that makes the whole strategy work. Business real property is carved out of the related-party rules that otherwise stop a fund dealing with you, so your business can lease premises from your own SMSF - at market rent, under a properly documented lease. Residential property gets no such exception, which is why you cannot live in a house your fund owns.

No. The sole purpose test means the fund exists to provide retirement benefits, so residential property it holds cannot be lived in or rented by you or any related party - not at market rent, not on weekends, not while it is between tenants. This did not change in August; it has always been the rule, and it is the single most common misunderstanding about SMSF property.