Search

Land use planning policies are a critical component of the institutional architecture that frames housing policy. Indeed a core goal of land use planning is to ensure an ‘adequate supply’ of housing. This chapter has three main components. Drawing on planning and land economics principles, it first examines the ways that land use planning measures, such as ‘inclusionary zoning’, can generate affordable housing and the generic arguments for such measures. Secondly it identifies features of Australia’s land use planning system that have direct implications for supporting affordable housing and discusses the various ways in, and extent to, which Australian governments have experimented with these. The chapter concludes by contesting popular claims that Australia’s land use planning regimes are a major cause of housing unaffordability.

This chapter examines government-led responses to the intensifying shortage of affordable housing. The emphasis is on endeavours to enable low cost (below-market) rental housing development using public subsidies and other incentives to leverage private investment, alongside adoption of new institutional and governance arrangements for affordable housing services. The chapter explains the operating principles of the affordable housing business model, including the role of public subsidy to meet the gap in funding between required investor returns and revenue based on affordable rents. International approaches to public–private co-financing are showcased, followed by an interpretation of potential lessons for Australia. The current status of Australian efforts to adopt new investment models and an analysis of the main domestic barriers to private institutional investment in affordable housing are also included.

Around one in every four Australians rent their home from a private landlord. The past two decades have seen strong growth in the private rental sector and a rising incidence of long-term (perhaps perpetual) renting, especially among younger and less affluent Australians. This chapter first describes the structure and institutions of Australia’s rental market, the private rental dwelling stock, and the sector’s residents. Tax and other policy settings affecting the form and level of private rental property investment are then explained. The focus then shifts to regulatory policy affecting the consumer experience of private rental and forms of government financial support to low-income renters. In view of the sector’s evolving significance, options for reform of present tax and regulatory policy settings are debated throughout.

Concerns surrounding affordability have become central to Australian housing debates. This chapter begins by describing the housing affordability issues that have been the focal point of what is popularly seen as Australia’s housing crisis, i.e. the growing hurdles faced by many would-be first home buyers, a trend generally attributed to house price inflation outstripping income growth and borrowing capacity. It then reviews the conceptual and practical issues of defining housing affordability and examines affordability outcomes across all tenures using a range of measures. That analysis helps shift the spotlight from home buyers to the intensifying rental affordability pressures affecting lower-income tenants. To conclude, the chapter discusses the underlying structural causes of Australia’s housing affordability problems and their potential consequences.

This chapter examines the motivations and justifications that underlie housing policy measures or ‘interventions’. The first part of the chapter discusses the classic stated reasons for government action in this sphere: measures to promote efficiency (countering ‘market failure’), to enhance equity (addressing social justice concerns) and to ensure economic stability. The application of these ideas to housing policy in Australia from the 1980s is then interpreted to show the influence of neo-liberal policy ideas. Having discussed the explanations of government intervention that stress the correction of market failure and the need to promote economic stability, the chapter goes on to review more critical perspectives on housing policy motivations and drivers, including political party ideologies, interest group politics and lobbying and a wider ‘political economy’ critique.

Indigenous peoples remain among the most disadvantaged Australians in terms of their housing needs. This chapter begins by discussing the historical and cultural factors and past policy approaches that helped to shape the specific housing needs of Indigenous Australians in both urban and remote geographic settings. The chapter continues by critically examining contemporary policy approaches to addressing Indigenous disadvantage and the barriers to achieving better housing outcomes. Policy responses are shown to have been complex and highly volatile, characterised by frequent changes in direction and shifting responsibilities across governments. Key challenges in the social housing, home ownership and private rental service systems are described. A central theme is consideration of how housing policies could be better aligned with cultural values and Indigenous aspirations.

Drawing on the evidence marshalled throughout the book, this chapter makes the case for fundamental reform of Australia’s housing policy regime and the associated governance of housing to address problems which are now deeply embedded in Australia’s housing system—especially unaffordable housing and growing wealth inequality. High level aims of reform and priority areas for action are proposed. Guiding principles to inform development of a long term comprehensive and cohesive national housing strategy are suggested. These include coordinated national leadership, tackling the causes of unaffordability, restoring tenure-neutral housing policies, rebuilding institutional capacity and prudently phasing reform. A set of short-term reforms with immediate potential to ease the affordable housing shortage and to promote the effective use of the national housing stock are also identified.

Home ownership has been seen as a core aspiration and value for most, if not all, Australians from European settlement to the present. This chapter begins by examining Australia’s home ownership rate in a comparative context. Trends in this rate, changes in government support for home ownership and the reasons for emerging concerns about falling rates of home ownership, particularly among younger households, are covered next. The question of why home ownership has a dominant role in Australia and in countries with similar economic, institutional and cultural backgrounds is then addressed. Whether the support provided to this tenure, especially, the tax/subsidy concessions that accrue to homeowners, is an appropriate role for government is also considered.

As in many other nations, Australia's intensifying shortage of affordable housing represents one of the most pressing policy challenges for government. Against a backdrop of ongoing population grow...

This paper presents results from the first international comparative study of non-profit housing organizations in Australia, England and the Netherlands to engage with panels of organizational leaders. The study uses a ‘modified Delphi method’ with Likert-type scaled surveys, followed by in-depth interviews. The paper introduces the concept of hybridity as a way of understanding the interaction of state, market and community drivers in steering non-profit housing organizations. In all three countries, findings indicate that there are clear limits to independence from continued state influence. In England this takes the form of state-directed cross-subsidy and welfare reform, in Australia business development strategies have had to respond to volatility and reductions in state funding, while in the Netherlands public policy has recently restricted the remit of associations to a low-income niche and reduced commercial involvement. These findings lend support to ‘contested logics’ models of organizational hybridity rather than either ‘out-of-control monstrous hybrids’ or linear privatization models.

This study analysed recently completed affordable housing developments across Australia to ascertain how affordable housing project costs, revenues and subsidies interact. The research reveals the diverse funding arrangements adopted by providers, which have resulted in affordable housing project outcomes being driven by funding opportunities rather than by defined housing needs, and identified six key lessons about financing affordable housing.

This study examined the range of strategies and initiatives governments have used to leverage affordable housing supply across the continuum of housing needs (i.e. from social housing to affordable rental and home ownership) in a constrained funding and increasingly market driven context across a range of different jurisdictions and markets.

Key findings This is the Final Report of an AHURI Inquiry into the capacity of Australia's affordable housing industry. Earlier reports from the Inquiry have focussed on the current state of the industry, the capacity impacts of transfers of public housing to non-government providers, and international experience of capacity issues pertaining to provision of affordable housing. Informed by these reports, and by an in-depth study of industry stakeholders' views, this report considers capacity constraints that need to be addressed in order to realise the industry's potential to help expand the nation's affordable housing supply and transform Australia's neglected public housing. Australia's affordable housing industry is a nascent but growing sector, largely involving not-for-profit providers subject to government regulation. With the nation's public housing system lacking the means to properly maintain its portfolio, let alone to expand provision, the affordable housing industry's future is critical to address the rising housing need experienced by low-income Australians. An estimated minimum of 200,000 additional affordable housing dwellings will be required over the next 20 years. Over three decades, the provider part of the industry has built a strong reputation for effective affordable housing management and, more recently, development, and has potential for further expansion. While a pre-eminent cohort of large, professionalised providers has emerged over the past decade, the industry retains considerable diversity including many providers serving specialist groups or rural and remote locations. An Inquiry research report (Milligan, Martin et al. 2016) provides a profile of registered providers. The following key findings draw on the informed perspectives of a wide range of stakeholders about perceived capacity issues within the industry and their ideas of possible ways to address these. • The existing policy and public subsidy framework is not fit-for-purpose. Stakeholders representing all main constituencies see the lack of an appropriate policy and resourcing framework for affordable housing as the single biggest constraint on the industry's capacity to supply more affordable housing. • A stable and supportive policy context is essential. Organisational scale and capacity has developed strongly during periods of growth, but retention of provider capacity has been undermined by volatile policy settings, and piecemeal and stop-start patterns of growth opportunities, experienced in recent years. •The industry is committed to, and ready for, expansion. Having invested heavily in their organisational capabilities, many existing large providers have under-utilised capacity. Further capacity building among providers can be stimulated via a planned and predictable approach to growth. • Governments should help providers achieve a stable financial footing. The goal to increase private financing of affordable housing calls for provider organisations to have larger balance sheets, and predictable and secure cash flows. Thus, governments have a key role in ensuring that providers have effective control over their assets and resources (many of which currently remain government owned) and that tenant rent subsidies (mainly paid via Commonwealth Rent Assistance) are secure and continuous. • There is scope to generate further provider economies of scale. Lenders and other industry experts argue that building the business scale of providers is crucial to enable them to shoulder greater financial risk and deliver larger-scale projects. However, this impetus must be balanced with preservation of industry diversity and the contribution of specialist providers. • Supporting institutions and frameworks lack necessary capacity. A web of supporting institutions and frameworks is crucial in maximising industry effectiveness. Industry-wide, there is general agreement about the following key capacity shortcomings: • Industry regulation needs a major overhaul to complete national coverage, refine the regulatory framework, enhance regulatory capacity, curb regulatory burden (e.g. duplicate contractual regulation) and align regulatory effort with a new policy direction. • A lack of political leadership and dismantling of housing policy-making capacity in government agencies in recent years has hindered industry development. This has contributed to a lack of mutual understanding about affordable housing operations between key government and industry players. Governments must invest in their capacity to fulfil their leadership, policy-making and regulatory roles. • A major overhaul of industry data and analytical capacity is required to identify the costs of affordable housing provision, improve accountability for tenant outcomes, inform resource allocations and improve services. Optimising publicly available information about the industry (e.g. publishing more regulator-collected data) will raise the industry's profile, facilitate identification of capacity deficiencies and help secure public and private financing. • Professional development requirements need to be enhanced. Employee development within the industry needs more attention. Industry-specific competencies required include: specialist property development and development finance ability; long-term asset management and asset-management planning; complex tenancy management; culturally-adapted housing services; and contract management. Priorities also include safeguarding the industry's ethos and core social values, and embedding in future leaders a balance of commercial skills and dedication to affordable housing and community development. • Industry leadership representing provider interests must be strengthened. To foster its development and represent its interests, the provider part of the industry will need to fortify its leadership and network more effectively with governments and other stakeholders. Presently, affordable housing providers have a low profile and peak bodies and peer networks are small and under-resourced. The recent absence of an effective national industry peak combined with diverse state-level approaches to industry development has contributed to fragmentation and duplication of effort and resources. • Industry development frameworks need to be explicitly linked to growth plans and targets. Past funding for capacity-building activities by governments and the industry has had mixed results (Milligan, Martin et al. 2016: Chapter 4). State and territory government efforts have been inhibited by the absence of a national framework for industry growth to which their capacity-building strategies could be aligned. • Industry re-engagement with the National Community Housing Standards (NCHS) is desirable. Review and revision of the existing 2010 standards could be a useful vehicle for reinvigoration of industry values and aspirations. Application of revised standards could help reinforce organisational missions and reputations, drive service improvements and help identify areas for training and industry development. • The future of the Indigenous housing sector is precarious. Indigenous housing providers have an important and culturally unique role in housing Indigenous tenants and supporting their diverse needs. Partly because recent policy reforms have dealt major blows to their viability, their place within the industry has diminished and the future for many is uncertain. Indigenous housing leaders participating in this study were deeply concerned about the recent lack of policy attention to their part of the industry in most jurisdictions. Commensurate with the findings from our extensive stakeholder consultations, our investigations into the development pathways of other industries undergoing growth and reform and national affordable housing systems elsewhere showed: • the paramount importance of policy continuity and directional clarity • industry stability and growth relies on government subsidies being adequate, appropriate and assured • the potential contribution of specialist institutions that can support key industry requirements-for example a custom-designed financial intermediary to facilitate provider access to low-cost funds (i.e. under consideration by the Australian Government and the Council of Federal Financial Relations) ? the significance of fit-for-purpose and responsive regulatory frameworks • the critical role for agencies within government to steward and champion the industry in its emerging phase. Policy development implications: a road map for the industry Industry vision The vision for the future of Australia's affordable housing system is one of a vibrant and sustainable industry that: • Mobilises efforts across the policy, financing, development and management fields of housing to create innovative ways to meet the housing needs of low and middle income Australians. • Can address relevant government priorities, including attracting cost-effective private financing, supporting successful city renewal, and creating economic opportunity and socially diverse communities. • Offers a continuum of affordable rental and ownership products that complement market-provided housing. • Sets best practice in tenant support and referral, responsive service provision, responsible asset management, socially integrated housing development and place-making.

Unlike debates about security for owner occupiers which recognise that security is complex and multi-layered, security for renters is often presented as single dimensional and conflated with de jure security of tenure, deriving from a property rights perspective. This article proposes a broader concept of ‘secure occupancy’ to enable a more nuanced understanding of security for tenants. A new framework is developed to enable investigation of the dynamic interactions between legislation/regulation, housing market conditions, public policies and cultural norms around renting, which shape security of occupancy for tenants. The paper illustrates this approach, drawing on a study of the rental systems of nine developed countries, identifying key factors that appear to have a strong bearing on strengthening, and weakening, of security of occupancy for renter households. The article concludes that this approach has the potential to deepen understanding of security for renters and to stimulate new avenues for res...

Mainly stimulated by concerns over inadequate housing supply, both the UK and Australia have recently seen renewed policy-maker interest in channelling ‘institutional investment’ into rental housebuilding. This has coincided with the recognition that – as seen in both countries – ongoing changes in the demographics of expanding private rental sectors reinforce the need for new forms of provision.Drawing on recent ‘informed stakeholder’ perspectives in both countries, we build on existing accounts through our analysis of barriers to institutional financing of rental housing and our investigation of what, if any, fundamental changes in market conditions and investor sentiment have recently occurred, so that such obstacles might potentially be overcome. Further developing this story, we compare and contrast recent ‘policy reform’ recommendations proposed in both countries with the aim of stimulating institutional investment in housebuilding.Although impediments to large-scale institutional funding for rental...

Australia's emerging affordable housing industry has considerable potential to expand housing options for lower income households. This study examines the industry's current profile and capacity. For the purposes of this study, the affordable housing industry comprises: ?Non-government (for-profit and not-for-profit) affordable housing providers. ?The institutions and individuals that enable, support and regulate their work. Capacity is the ability of the industry to perform its work. Capacity is multidimensional and includes having: ?The resources to do the work, appropriate organisational and workforce capacities, industry-specific skills, effective networks and political influence. The regulated industry comprises two main types of providers: A group of 40 commercially-oriented entities that raise private finance, procure housing and offer diversified housing services. Most in this group could accommodate further expansion and develop their own future capacity. A second group of 283 smaller organisations that mainly provide governmentcontracted tenancy and/or homelessness services. Many have growth potential but lack resources. Capacity-building could be targeted to assist this group. There is also a sizeable group of (both registered and unregistered) Indigenous-run community housing organisations (ICHOs). Limited operating scale, poor viability and recent policy disruptions have left many ICHOs vulnerable. An intentional tailored approach to building scale and capacity among this group is critical to ambitions to 'close the gap' in Indigenous disadvantage. Key gaps in industry infrastructure include the absence of: Clear and consistent government and industry leadership. A core industry data set. A financial intermediary to harness private investment. For the industry overall, the main capacity issues identified so far concern: ?The need for scaled-up and predictable growth opportunities to promote further capacity development and strategic investment. Shortcomings in policy-making capacities and regulation.

Australian social housing policy continues to move away from a traditional hierarchical public housing model. The small but fast growing not-for-profit sector has expanded through the introduction of private finance, a tax credit scheme, stock transfers, planning incentives and an economic stimulus package. This article examines the diverse ways in which the leading not-for-profit providers in Australia have responded to these opportunities, using the concept of organisational hybridity. Coverage of hybridity includes both established housing providers and emergent third sector organisations including finance consolidators, development consortia and cross-subsidisation vehicles. Using information from interviews, organisational case studies and documentation, this paper assesses the drivers for the growth of hybridity in Australia. The policy implications for governments steering a diverse housing sector through promoting hybrid organisations are discussed, and reflections are provided on the opportunitie...

The Commonwealth's policy capacity with regard to housing policy and provision has been erratic and patchy. Partly this is because housing was not traditionally a formal Commonwealth responsibility but something in which Commonwealth governments episodically intervened, and partly it was because Commonwealth ministers often did not exercise demand for policy advice in this area. When policy capacity was exercised it tended to define housing narrowly as a welfare initiative, thereby limiting its conception and excluding other important questions and problems involved with housing as a policy domain. This trajectory meant that the advisory deficiencies of the Commonwealth were often exposed at exactly those times when they were most needed. It also meant that the Commonwealth lacked the detailed knowledge and understanding of housing issues when it was called upon to deliver various programs. The article argues that the Commonwealth needs to adopt a more strategic housing policy that addresses longer term needs as well as the economic, social and environmental consequences of its housing policy.

Following election of a new national government in November 2007, Australian housing policy is undergoing major reform under the leadership of the first dedicated national Housing Minister since 1996. A new intergovernmental agreement to frame future housing policy and drive major reform of social housing commenced in 2009. The Australian Government has also embarked on a variety of major housing initiatives that include: offering subsidies to private investors in new affordable rental housing; subsidising costs of residential development where savings are passed to homebuyers; and national partnership agreements, which incorporate targets to improve housing in remote Indigenous communities and to significantly reduce homelessness. As well, investments in additional social housing and cash assistance to first homebuyers have featured strongly in economic stimulus packages that are designed to offset domestic impacts of the global financial crisis. An increase of over 220 per cent in national gove...

This paper aims to contribute to the debate in comparative housing studies about the significance of national housing policies by considering what can be learnt from analysing the consequences of different policy paths. In particular, the paper looks at the evidence of the long-run impacts of different housing strategies adopted to assist lower-income households in Australia and the Netherlands, using housing affordability as a measure of their impact. Australia is an example of a country that has promoted mass home ownership across the income distribution supplemented by a very small public housing system. In contrast, the Netherlands has relied more on a large and diversified social housing sector. The comparative analysis shows that there are many similarities in the patterns of affordability among low-income households in the two countries despite the use of different policy means. In the past, both countries had good success providing secure and affordable housing for poorer households. Now, lower-income households are experiencing greater affordability problems that are linked to societal changes and the retrenchment of government housing assistance in both cases. However, the study also finds that affordability problems among lower-income households are worse in Australia because of the greater reliance on private housing in that country.

This book takes a comparative method and applies it for the first time to an analysis of the contemporary housing situation of a regional grouping of countries in South-East Europe. The central con...

This article begins with a brief overview of the factors that have contributed to problems of access and affordability. This is followed by a rationale for policies that improve access and affordability, which highlights their impact on individual households and on the economy as a whole. A taxonomy of the policies that are possible (and an indication of where these are used) gives insight into the diverse range of direct and indirect forms of assistance that can be provided through demand- and supply-side assistance as well as through regulation. The penultimate section discusses the context in which different types of policies might be effective in achieving their objectives. The final section highlights the importance of evaluating these policies against a broad rather than narrow range of objectives.

This article is concerned with the institutional context of strategies to provide housing to meet the needs of those whose incomes are insufficient to obtain appropriate housing in the housing market otherwise. It describes a variety of approaches that have been adopted to providing affordable housing and identifies the roles and contributions of different institutions across the housing system, covering governments, private agencies, not-for-profit organisations, and intermediaries. Characteristics of the historic and contemporary contributions of each of these institutional groups to the provision of affordable housing are described, with examples from a range of countries and regions.

The National Housing Policy Review was established in June 1988 by the Minister for Housing and Aged Care, Peter Staples, to assess the performance of the housing assistance programs within his portfolio and to develop strategies for improving the effectiveness of these programs.