Australians faces an even more unequal future unless post-pandemic housing policy focuses on equity, solidarity and security. .
We’re having children seven years later, getting married is eight years later, buying homes nine years later, and increasingly retiring without them.
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Josh Frydenberg’s review of the retirement income system will have to consider the growing hole caused by our decisions to delay buying homes for longer and longer.
Building an extra 50,000 homes each year for a decade could make prices and rents 20% cheaper.
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The key to arresting galloping inequality in Australia comes down to housing policy and reversing spiralling housing costs.
Increasing numbers of older Australians face a harder time paying the bills when they retire because they’ll still be paying off a mortgage or renting a home.
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People over 65 who still have a mortgage or are renting are projected to double in number by 2031. The trend is likely to hit government budgets and leave more retirees in poverty.
Shared houses work well for 82% of people living in them in their early 20s, but only 25% see this as a long-term option.
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The housing aspirations of young Australians change as they enter their late 20s and early 30s. But having somewhere safe and secure to call home is the top priority for all young adults.
Older Australians aspire to the security of owning their own home, but prefer smaller houses in their later years.
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Most older Australians want to live in a home they own, preferably in the middle and outer suburbs of a city. But increasing numbers look unlikely to realise their housing aspirations.
Families can use their EITC to improve their housing.
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The Earned Income Tax Credit was established in 1975 to reduce payroll taxes and help with rising prices for low-income families. Today, it could help poor families with housing.
“Churning” out of and back in to home ownership is becoming common. We haven’t caught up.
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Our retirement incomes system has been built around the assumption that most will own their own homes. New projections suggest it’s no longer valid.
Illustration of ‘Axminster’ linoleum, in ‘Catesby’s one-piece linola squares’, Catesbys Colourful Cork Lino (1938).
BADDA 181, courtesy of the Museum of Domestic Design & Architecture, Middlesex University, www.moda.mdx.ac.uk
Ian Ramsay, The University of Melbourne; Lev Bromberg, The University of Melbourne, and Paul Ali, The University of Melbourne
Research on bankrupts illustrates the contrasting financial fortunes of older Australians.
Queensland Minister for Housing and Public Works Mick de Brenni announced a $2b housing scheme he said would create more affordable housing in the state.
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Queensland Minister for Housing and Public Works Mick de Brenni made the claim while announcing a $2 billion housing investment scheme. But is the claim correct?
People should be able to feel at home regardless of whether they own the place they live in.
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Renting a house shouldn’t mean it’s not home. Until we change our meaning of home by separating it from ownership, we will never be able to “fix” Australia’s housing crisis.
As the dream of home ownership eludes more and more older Australians, this has big implications for retirement, pensions and government spending on rental assistance.
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Until now most people have eventually owned a home. But two trends – falling ownership and a growing aged population – will put the budgets of retirees and government under real pressure.
Cuba is freeing up the market in residential private property but with a public referendum still to come, what impact will such measures have for ordinary Cubans.
There’s never been enough funding to ensure affordable housing for those who need it.
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Another affordable housing pact between the Commonwealth, states and territories came into effect this month. But with no new funding, the agreement may be different from predecessors in name only.
Millennials dream of home ownership. In expensive cities like Toronto and Vancouver, they’re saving up to buy homes by living with their parents or taking on tenants once they save up enough to buy.
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Canada’s millennials want to own homes in the country’s most expensive cities, Toronto and Vancouver. Here’s how they’re managing to do so, but is it sustainable?
The old pathways to home ownership have been displaced by more uncertain routes that waver between owning and renting.
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Increasingly insecure pathways to home ownership are not just a problem for property markets. The fallout is likely to hit retirement incomes, the welfare base, gender equity and the broader economy.
A new report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies shows home ownership rates have collapsed: today, just one in four middle-income millennials will own their own home.
Professor; School of Economics, Finance and Property, and Director, Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, Curtin Research Centre, Curtin University