Rent assistance and young people's decision making

Summary

Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) has a positive impact upon education participation – an important outcome of this form of housing assistance. Seventy per cent of surveyed recipients stated CRA had been a factor in their decision to study. CRA was particularly important for the education participation of two groups: those from remote or rural centres, with 40% reporting it as a major factor; and secondary students living independently with over half claiming it was of major significance.

Project Number: 50007
Research Theme: Private_Rental
Project Leader: Burke, Terry
Funding Year: 2000
Research Centre: Swinburne-Monash

Research & Policy Bulletin

Issue 011: Young people and housing

For young people, more than any other household type, decisions about housing are closely linked to employment and education. We therefore need to know whether the housing market is working in a way that encourages or at least helps make it possible, for young people to continue their education or to gain work after commencing independent living.

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Description

This project is about the impact that the combination of rent assistance and youth allowance has on young people's decision making with respect to housing, education and employment. At the end of 1999 Swinburne Institute for Social Research (ISR) undertook a nation-wide survey for the Department of Family and Community Services (FaCS) designed to provide the Department with information on the extent to which eligibility for rent assistance impacts on young people's decisions to study and how it influences choice of educational institution, living arrangement, and engagement in paid employment-in other words, the non-shelter aspects of housing assistance. A second objective of the research was to develop a data set to supplement the existing rent assistance database and to provide initial information on students on youth allowance as a new rent assistance client group (students under 25 became eligible for youth allowance, and therefore rent assistance from 1 July 1998). The study surveyed over 8,000 young people with a response rate of 42 per cent yielding some 3,000 responses. The sample was stratified into six customer groups on the basis of their receipt or non-receipt of rent assistance.

We believe the findings have broader importance in terms of building knowledge capacity about housing assistance for young people in Australia. It is one of the few studies to look at how housing assistance shapes non-shelter outcomes and provides an innovative model for assessing the actual and potential impact of housing programs. The research and the report :

Identify the housing-related decision making of young people aged 16-25;
Provide information on the extent to which eligibility for rent assistance impacts on young people's decisions to study and how it influences their choice of educational institution, living arrangement and engagement in paid employment;
Identify the degree to which rent assistance positively influences non-shelter outcomes, particularly as they relate to the capacity of young people to pursue educational and training opportunities;
Identify the problems in the private rental market as they affect young people and specify whether the perceived problems for young people differ according to circumstance or location.

More Information

Research and Policy Bulletin: Issue 011: Young people and housing
74 KB PDF Document

Final Report: No. 006: Rent assistance and young people's decision making
213 KB PDF Document

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