Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute

In March 2022, the major Australian media organisation, Are Media, along with a coalition of women's sector groups, launched ‘Unhoused’, a pre-election advocacy campaign calling for increased funding to address a national crisis that sees 49,000 Australian women homeless.

With government policies and election promises seeking to promote downsizing amongst older Australians, it is important to understand just what it entails. Downsizing is the process by which a household moves from one dwelling to another that may be either smaller in size or of lower value, or both. The concept of downsizing is usually applied to older Australians when they move prior to or during their retirement.

Commonwealth and state/territory support for home buyers takes a number of different forms; however, government support has long term public benefits when it focusses on increasing the number of dwellings in the community.