Briefs

The Housing First model is a strategic response to homelessness that prioritises permanent and stable housing for people experiencing homelessness. Beginning in the USA in the 1990s, the model has been taken up by several European countries, Canada, and recently the New Zealand Government announced a homelessness package which included NZ$63.4 million (AUS$58.6 million) towards Housing First programs

A new report by the Australian Institute of Family Studies investigated the costs associated with bringing up children and found that ‘the largest single contribution to the overall family budget in all cases was housing costs’.

Recent analysis and media coverage suggests that the current house price boom means young Australians are likely to be financially worse off than their parents, and that more first-home buyers are relying on their parents’ wealth than ever before. Just how many first home buyers are relying on intergenerational wealth transfers, either through cash transfers or through inheritance, and how are they benefiting?

The Tasmanian Housing Minister, Roger Jaensch MP, has indicated that the Tasmanian Government plans to pay investors up to $13,000 a year if they make their properties available to low-income renters, in a new bid to address that state's housing crisis. The housing assistance plan aims to enable low income households to secure affordable rental properties with 12 month leases at an affordable rent.

This is the first of three AHURI Briefs that examines Census data to understand how homelessness is changing in Australia. The 2016 Census reveals that 116,427 people were experiencing homelessness in August 2016, which was a 13.7 per cent increase, or an additional 13,988 people, to the 2011 Census. Over the same time period Australia’s population rose by a smaller 8.8 per cent, from 21,507,717 people in 2011 to 23,401,892 in 2016.