The State of the Housing System 2024 annual report, presented to the Hon. Julie Collins MP Minister for Housing and released today, laid bare the challenges of the housing system in Australia.
This was the first report from the newly established National Housing Supply and Affordability Council chaired by Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz, which sets out the Council’s approach to improving Australia’s housing landscape through the Government’s ambitious housing reform agenda.
“Urban Development Institute of Australia (UDIA) agrees with the Minister’s comments that we need homes of every type, more social homes, more affordable rental homes, more homes to rent and more homes to buy,” said Col Dutton, UDIA National President.
Today’s report put the crisis in sharp focus with a forecasting model that predicts between 2023-24 and 2028–29 new supply will be 39,000 dwellings short of new demand. The model predicts new builds (minus demolitions) of 1,040,000 and new demand of 1,079,000 across the nation.
In her speech, Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz said “There is no denying the housing crisis we are in. It is a longstanding crisis, fundamentally driven by the failure to deliver enough housing of all types. The problems in our housing market are deep seated and there is no easy fix.”
UDIA’s own 2024 State of the Land report highlights the critical situation showing that the supply of new homes will crash to the lowest level in over a decade by 2026, worsening housing and rental affordability, a double hit of increasing house prices and rents, both of which are already at record highs.
The Minister spoke of a number of initiatives including the National Housing Accord target of 1.2m well located houses to be built over five years, the $3 billion new homes bonus, a $500 million housing support program, $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund, and new incentives planned to boost the supply of rental housing.
However there are a number of critical factors to overcome to achieve the desired outcome of enabling more Australians to know the security of affordable home ownership. These include insufficient supply, rising interest rates, skills shortages, increased construction costs, weak consumer confidence and cost inflation to name just a few.
Government needs to remove the obstacles preventing the supply of affordable housing for our growing population and help take the pressure off affordability. We have no time to wait and we need to get this right for the people of Australia desperate to get into a home of their own.
In her closing remarks, Ms Lloyd-Hurwitz said, “Building a better system will require focussed, coordinated and consistent effort over the long run across all jurisdictions.”
“UDIA and our members across the nation stand ready to work in collaboration with the Federal, State and Local Governments and the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council to do just that,” said Mr Dutton.
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