People on moderate incomes, including police and emergency workers, have been forced to seek housing on the city fringes, far from their places of work. But there are ways to reverse this trend.
Over the past year, there has been a surge of enthusiasm in Australia for developing a sector of large-scale institutional landlords.
AAP/David Crosling
There is a risk that affordable housing policy may be colonised by for-profit interests if Australia imports the wrong rental housing ideas from overseas.
“Looking for one girl to share a master room with another 3 girls.”
Screenshot from Gumtree ad, August 19 2017, 11:58
City living costs are driving people to organise themselves to share a room with strangers. These precarious living arrangements hardly qualify as a home.
The impact of Airbnb varies from city to city and suburb to suburb.
AlesiaKan/shutterstock
About 10% of empty dwellings on census night – 1.2% of all housing – were available for rental and vacancy rates have changed little in 35 years. Could governments be overreacting?
Around one in seven Australia households either cannot get into housing at market rates or are struggling to pay the rent.
shutterstock
One in seven Australian households is in a state of housing need. A shortfall in social housing supply means some are locked out of the market and others pay much more for rent than they can afford.
It is not well appreciated that the requirements of affordable housing are related to – but not the same as – those for housing affordability.
AAP/Sam Mooy
New research reveals outdated concepts and thinking are shaping Australia’s troubled housing system.
Households are not competing on equal terms in the private rental market – their perceptions of insecurity vary according to their means, location and reasons for renting.
April Fonti/AAP
Private renters’ security of tenure in Australia has less legal protection than in other countries with high private rental rates. A new study reveals mixed responses to this state of uncertainty.
The Rental Vulnerability Index for Queensland shows the cumulative impact of factors affecting renters across the state.
City Futures Research Centre
Almost nowhere in our capital cities can low-income households – and those on average incomes in Sydney – afford the median rent. Mapping rental vulnerability finds it in regional areas too.
Even properties at the lower end of the market are beyond the means of most people on low fixed incomes.
Tom Rabe/AAP
Only a small proportion of housing is affordable for low-income earners, while people on Newstart or Youth Allowance don’t have any affordable options at all.
Not all renters will be able to become – or want to become – home owners.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
Any attempt to improve security for tenants should not deprive them, or their landlords, of the flexibility that many also want. The key problem is landlords’ ability to give notice without a reason.
On current trends, renters will eventually outnumber home buyers, representing a fundamental shift in how the economy and wealth generation work.
Mick Tsikas/AAP
Generation Rent may force a complete rethinking of home ownership as a basis of our housing systems. Rather than representing security, these housing markets make us vulnerable.