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New AHURI research, ‘Modelling housing need in Australia to 2025’, has developed a model to estimate housing need in Australia over the next decade.

The number of households eligible to receive Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) is estimated to rise from 952,000 in 2011 to 1.5 million in 2031, a 61 per cent increase, new AHURI research has found.

The 2016 Census reveals the proportion of home owners (i.e. those who either owned their home outright or were still buying) dropped from 68.6 per cent of all households in 1991 to 65.5 per cent in 2016. The biggest change during this time period was a fall of 10 percentage points in outright home owners between 1991 and 2016, and an increase of nearly 7 percentage points in the proportion of households paying off their mortgage.

High house prices (particularly in Sydney and Melbourne) have led to calls for the easing of supply-side restrictions such as opening up more land for development and speeding up the planning approval process. But will increasing the supply of new homes lead to more affordable housing for low-income households?

With memories of the circumstances that led to the GFC, it might seem that current investors would be interested in reducing their debt and financial risks. However AHURI research reveals that property investors with mortgage debt increased their consumption (that is the amount they borrowed or spent) after the GFC suggesting such investors are not as risk-averse as other homeowners.