Housing Australia Future Fund
The $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund will now be established, creating a secure, ongoing pipeline of funding for social and affordable rental housing. The Housing Australia Future Fund which will build 30,000 new social and affordable housing properties in its first five years, and create thousands of jobs. We need to build more social housing, upgrade existing housing, and make sure that the promise of home ownership is extended to all Australians.
Over the first 5 years the investment returns will build around:
- 20,000 social housing properties – 4,000 of which will be allocated for women and children fleeing domestic and family violence and older women on low incomes who are at risk of homelessness.
- 10,000 affordable homes for the frontline workers like police, nurses and cleaners who kept us safe during the pandemic. This will mean they can live closer to where they work, and it will mean better services for everyday Australians.
The Fund will also deliver the Government’s commitments to help address acute housing needs, including:
- $200 million for the repair, maintenance and improvement of housing in remote Indigenous communities
- $100 million for crisis and transitional housing for women and children impacted by family and domestic violence and older women at risk of homelessnes
- And $30 million to build housing for veterans who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness
Help to Buy
The Albanese Government will help more people get into the housing market sooner by cutting the cost of buying a home by up to 40 per cent.
This will mean a smaller deposit, a smaller mortgage and smaller mortgage repayments.
Help to Buy will be open to 10,000 Australians each financial year.
Eligible home buyers will need a minimum deposit of 2 per cent, with an equity contribution from the Federal Government of up to a maximum of 40 per cent of the purchase price of a new home and up to a maximum of 30 per cent of the purchase price for an existing home.
National Housing Supply and Affordability Council
The package of housing legislation passed by the Parliament also includes the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council Bill 2023, which will establish the National Housing Supply and Affordability Council as an independent statutory advisory body.
The Council will be advised by experts from a diverse range of relevant fields including finance, economics, urban development, residential construction, urban planning and social housing sectors.
Improvements in land supply and land use planning have the potential to improve housing affordability and provide a boost to national productivity and economic growth.
Labor’s National Housing Supply and Affordability Council will:
- Set targets for land supply in consultation with State and Territory Governments.
- Collect and make public on a regular basis nationally consistent data on housing supply, demand and affordability. This includes the volume and price of land, material costs, availability of labour, training schemes, enabling infrastructure and time taken to navigate planning and development processes.
- Advise on ways to improve land use planning and land supply which will boost national productivity and improve housing affordability.
- Report on the release of government owned land.
- Report on rental affordability and homelessness.
- Report on the number of new social and affordable homes being built annually and advise on ways to boost the construction of social and affordable housing.
- Advise on appropriate housing measures to be included in all current and future City and Regional Deals.
There is no silver bullet to fix the housing affordability problem in Australia, but by planning for the future, the Albanese Labor Government will help Australians realise their dream.
