Australia's Housing Crisis

Can we learn from Britain's successes in affordable rental housing

The shift to not-for-profit housing associations continued after Labour took government in 1997. Smaller and locally based, housing associations were seen as more agile than councils, more attentive to tenants’ needs and better aligned with Tony Blair’s “Third Way.”

These arguments are familiar in Australia, where the not-for-profit, or “community,” sector is also growing. The Community Housing Industry Association’s chief executive, Wendy Hayhurst, recently urged the Albanese government to direct all the proceeds from its $30 billion Housing Australia Future Fund to her sector rather than do the “easy thing” and divvy the money up among community, state and private providers.

Hayhurst argued that community housing scores better on ratings of quality and resident satisfaction, a claim supported by the Productivity Commission’s most recent Report on Government Services. With its charitable status, the community sector is exempt from GST, land tax and stamp duty, which Hayhurst says enables it to build more houses for any given amount of money than state governments or businesses can.

Yes, people with homes will be upset, but if it expedites the building of Affordable Housing, It is time called!

Mortgage prisoners trapped by negative equity are renting out their homes

First home buyer Nilesh Shukla also just had his rent hiked.

It was around $500 a week and increased to $700 for his property near Sydney's Olympic Park.

"We have opened our borders. And because of that the demand has increased," he notes.

"And with the increase in demand, getting a rental is also difficult. Honestly speaking."

And that may just push him to buying a home instead as it would be the same in mortgage repayments, as long as the agent is willing to "negotiate".

Green Square, 4km from the airport, is the focus of a major urban renewal project.

City West’s plans for the site, which is residual land from the creation of the Ashmore Connector East Road, include 275 apartments across two buildings of nine and 11 storeys building with communal open space, basement level carparking and space for retail or commercial tenancies on the ground floor.


If approved, the development will offer a GFA of 25,270sq m with 23,467sq m of that set aside for affordable rental housing and 1599sq m for retail or commercial tenancies.

The proposed nine-storey building on the southern boundary of the site has a stepped design while the 11-storey building would front the eastern boundary.

City West Housing will undertake a design competition when and if the application is been approved. Once a design has been chosen, another more detailed development application will be submitted for planning approval.

This household profile depicts rental affordability for all dwellings with household incomes varying by city as shown below.

The average annual incomes for each city in Q2, 2022 are:

Greater Sydney: $115,000
Rest of NSW: $85,000
Greater Melbourne: $105,000
Rest of VIC: $80,000
Greater Brisbane: $100,000
Rest of QLD: $90,000
Greater Adelaide: $85,000
Rest of SA: $75,000
Greater Perth: $100,000
Rest of WA: $105,000
Greater Hobart: $85,000
Rest of TAS: $70,000
ACT: $125,000


 https://www.sgsep.com.au/maps/rai/australia-rental-affordability-index-nov22-official/

Overall, though, Holleran is sympathetic to the YIMBY view that “building nothing is not an option.” He points out that hyperlocalism can provide cover for “latent racism and an unwillingness to share space and resources with others.”

In San Francisco and Austin, planning controls and rising real estate prices have coincided with a rapid decline in the cities’ African-American population. Rather than “devolved decision-making” he would back the YIMBY call for city-, region- or even nationwide planning that de-emphasises the interests of individual homeowners and enables rational infrastructure and a fairer sharing of the costs and benefits of urban growth.