Alan Morris, University of Technology Sydney; Hal Pawson, UNSW Sydney; Kath Hulse, Swinburne University of Technology, and Violet Xia, University of Technology Sydney
While politicians ignore calls to raise Newstart, alarming levels of financial stress among private renters, particularly in low-rent outer suburbs, show why current welfare payments are too low.
The right to rent scheme has been found by the high court to breach human rights. What’s more, it doesn’t work, and can prevent society’s most vulnerable from finding a home.
Working-class residents of Waterloo have a history of resisting threats to their community. Many tenants see the redevelopment of public housing as state-led gentrification to squeeze them out.
Most renters are happy with their landlords and happy with the quality of their accommodation, but they would like better security of tenure and cheaper rent.
Even though house prices have risen substantially over recent decades, housing affordability for those with mortgages or own their houses outright hasn’t worsened
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.
Governments, developers and urban planners all aspire to create liveable cities. Yet when it comes to Australian cities, the rhetoric and reality don’t quite match.
The latest 2016 Census data assesses what the national home ownership and rental rates are and how these vary location. It also gives us a picture of mortgage and rental costs.
Professor of Social Epidemiology and Director of the Centre of Research Excellence in Healthy Housing at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, The University of Melbourne
Lecturer, Australian Centre for Housing Research, University of Adelaide, and Research Associate, ESRC Research Centre on Micro-Social Change, University of Essex