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An eight-year-old has purchased her first house after pooling pocket money with her siblings – but not without a lot of help from the bank of mum and dad.

Ruby McLellan has earned the title of ‘Australia’s youngest homeowner’ by investing money she made doing chores for her parents.

With the help of her siblings Angus and Lucy, who are 14 and 13 respectively, Ruby managed to put down $6,000 (£3,092) as a deposit on the four-bedroom property in Clyde, Victoria.

The home on Melbourne’s southeast fringe, which they purchased for $671,000 in 2021, is now worth $960,000 – a whopping $289,000 growth in value over the last three years. Ruby’s parents lent them the remaining cash for the deposit, and all their names are on the title.

(Ruby standing outside the house she owns with her siblings.Picture: McLellan family)

The home is ‘positively geared’ – meaning that rent paid is higher than mortgage repayments, so it is not costing the family money to hold the asset.

Dad Cam McLellan is the CEO of property investment company OpenCorp.

He has been keen to get his kids into property and teach them the basics of investing, so they can get a head start.

‘In ten years time when our kids might start looking to buy their own homes, the deposits are going to be $200,000. There’s no way kids of today are going to be able to afford a home without help from mum and dad,’ Cam said.

‘We have four kids and might need to fork out $800,000, so the obvious thing to do is to use one small deposit now, buy a property, let it double in value and then sell it.’

Ref: I saved my pocket money and now I’m a landlord, aged 8 (metro)

Photo Credit: McLellan family