Labor's rental affordability scheme had its problems, but let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater.
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Articles on Rental affordability
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Once rent is paid, having to live on only $14 a day doesn't cover the costs of job seeking. The evidence of the need to increase Newstart and Rent Allowance is overwhelming.
Living in shared rooms is on the rise, because it's more affordable – and more profitable for landlords. But it's also a more precarious, often overcrowded and poorly regulated form of housing.
Labor has made a substantial commitment to tackling inequality in Australia, but has taken a second-best approach to overcoming the huge shortfall of social housing.
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.
Short-term letting via digital platforms benefits some in the market at the expense of others. Closer regulation might be needed in Melbourne and Sydney, where a permissive approach prevails.
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.
Cities overseas that have been able to overcome the affordable housing challenges facing cities like Melbourne have adopted a coordinated and systemic approach to scaling up solutions that work.
The standards we use today were designed to help avoid the overcrowded housing that blighted cities in the past. But severe overcrowding is again on the rise, so what needs to be done?
Housing affordability is one of Australia’s great unsolved problems. Some households can make adjustments to cover high housing costs, but the ones deprived of essentials are under real stress.
If local government is to deliver affordable housing, state and federal governments must assist. Even councils as powerful and well resourced as the City of Sydney cannot do it by themselves.
The Australian government has at last taken the lead in affordable housing policy with a package of measures that should attract institutional investors hungry for low-risk returns.
Unaffordable housing and homelessness are burning issues. Policymaking has suffered from a critical lack of data and expert input since the National Housing Supply Council was axed in 2013.
A modest rebalancing of federal tax policy toward build-to-rent housing could fill affordable housing funding gaps. Australian funds are already investing in such a scheme in the US.
Why can't the state fund an ongoing program of upgrading, replacing and building public housing? On the evidence to date, private developers aren't doing a better job of it.
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.
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.
In a market already tilted in favour of landlords, these apps could further push up prices.
Who is entitled to the increase in value created by planning approvals, new infrastructure, population growth or urban development? For John Stuart Mill, the answer would have been the community.
Owning a home has deep cultural and economic connotations. A home owner is a member of a street, a community. They are a successful adult human. They own a piece of the pie, the dream.
Top contributors
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Lecturer in Urbanism, University of Sydney
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Associate Director - City Futures - Urban Policy and Strategy, City Futures Research Centre, Housing Policy and Practice, UNSW
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Visiting Professor, Urban Planning, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa
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Research Professor, University of Technology Sydney
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Honorary Associate Professor, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University
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Research Fellow, City Futures Research Centre, UNSW
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Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Toronto
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Senior Lecturer in Economy and Society, Department of Sociology, Macquarie University
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Professor of Urban Policy and Director, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University
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Associate Professor, Centre for Urban Transitions and Director, Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute Swinburne Research Centre, Swinburne University of Technology
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Professor of Urban Planning, University of Melbourne
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Research Lecturer, City Futures Research Centre, UNSW
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PhD Candidate, Urban Geography, University of Sydney
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Future Fellow, University of Melbourne
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Professor, School of Law, University of South Australia
