As Australia votes, a housing affordability crisis is top of voters’ minds

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Sydney, Australia – When Mary votes in Australia’s national elections on Saturday, the country’s chronic shortage of affordable housing will be at the top of her mind.

For two years, the 59-year-old former postal worker has been staying in short-term accommodations in regional New South Wales along with her daughter and her dog.

Mary receives income from a fortnightly old age pension of 1051.30 Australian dollars (US$673) and seasonal hospitality and retail jobs, but she cannot afford the median rent on a house or apartment of 560 dollars (US$360) a week.

Mary, who asked to be referred to by her first name, tried applying for social housing but was told the waiting list was “very, very long”.

“Once the money we had went on rent, and with no work, we landed here,” Mary told Al Jazeera.

“Now I have to pay storage to keep our lives in storage or lose everything. A situation I never envisioned I would ever find myself in.”

Mary intends to vote for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s centre-left Labor Party, which is favoured to return to power, though she is not enthusiastic about any of the main parties.

“I will probably vote Labor, although neither party is doing enough. I never vote Coalition,” she told Al Jazeera, referring to Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal Party and the rural-focused National Party.

“I find them non-transparent and rooted in fluffing up their own bank balances and those of their elitist mates at the expense of those who pay their taxes, which so many politicians dodge.”

Australia’s property and rental prices are among the top issues in an election race that has been dominated by concerns over the rising cost of living.

Australia, where property is a national obsession, is home to some of the highest house prices on the planet.

Sydney, the country’s largest city, ranks as the second-least affordable market out of 94 urban centres worldwide, according to the most recent Demographia International Housing Affordability survey, with a median price-to-income ratio of 13.8.

Research by property consultancy PropTrack has found that a household in Sydney needs to earn about 280,000 Australian dollars a year (US$180,000) to afford the median house price of 1.4 million Australian dollars (US$0.9m).

Both Labor and the Coalition have unveiled a number of housing policies to attract voters, who have been casting their ballots in early voting since April 22, although campaigners say neither appears prepared to tackle the root causes of the problem.

Labor has pledged to build 100,000 homes for first-time buyers and increase financial support, while the Liberals have promised to train more construction apprentices, invest in essential infrastructure, and allow younger Australians to withdraw their pensions early to pay for their housing deposit.

Both parties have also taken aim at foreign buyers and immigration, with Albanese earlier this year announcing a two-year ban on non-citizens buying existing homes.

Economists have pointed to a lack of supply as the fundamental cause of the housing crisis.

Australia had the lowest housing stock per capita in the developed world at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, with approximately 400 houses per 1000 people, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

While the supply of housing has improved somewhat since then, it has been far outstripped by demand driven by record inward migration.

Australia’s population grew 2.1 percent in 2024, even as the country’s birthrate sank to a 17-year low.

The construction of social housing, in particular, has fallen by the wayside.

In 2023, there were 169,000 households on a waiting list for public housing, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.

Yumi Lee, chief executive at Older Women’s Network NSW, said many older women in particular find it harder to secure housing due to having smaller pensions compared with their male peers.

A 2021 KPMG report found women aged 60-64 had 57,207 Australian dollars (US$36,608) less in their pension pot than men, on average.

“We are called the so-called lucky country, but so many older women are having to choose between food, medicine or rent, and it’s not a matter of luck, it’s a matter of neglect,” Lee told Al Jazeera.

Kris, a 71-year-old pensioner in the Blue Mountains, near Sydney, said she nearly became homeless last year after being forced to sell the family home following her divorce.

“I hear story after story of these sorts of things happening,” Kris, who asked to use a pseudonym, told Al Jazeera.

Experts say a range of factors have aggravated the housing shortage, including NIMBYism and a lack of tradesmen.

More controversially, housing advocates have directed blame towards negative gearing, a type of tax relief that allows landlords to write off losses incurred from their investment property.

After pledging to scale back negative gearing, Labor ditched the proposals during the 2022 election after it suffered two consecutive election defeats.

Maiy Azize, the national spokesperson for the pressure group Everybody’s Home, said neither of the major parties seemed willing to tackle the issue.

“This is a crisis that took decades to create, and it’s going to take decades to fix, but we do need someone to step up and take the first steps,” Azize told Al Jazeera.

“If a party was inclined to start a program to really boost social housing and to do that tax reform, they could make a big impact really quickly, but it is something that’s gonna take time to fix,” she said.

Bernie Barrett, the acting chief executive of Better Renting, said a positive step forward would be for the federal and state governments to develop nationally consistent rental laws.

“Around 30 percent of Australians rent their home, and even though we’re such a large demographic, our issues have largely been ignored by politicians and policymakers,” Barrett, whose organisation has rated Labor as “slow” and the Liberals as “getting worse” for progress on rental policies, told Al Jazeera.

Andrea Leong, a 38-year-old renter and microbiologist living in Albanese’s New South Wales electorate of Gryandler, said she feels neglected by both major parties.

“In Australia, we have been given this idea that owning a home is the Australian dream. Renting your home is seen as an unfortunate or a temporary situation,” Leong told Al Jazeera.

“I want the prime minister and all sides of politics to recognise that renting is a legitimate way of living.”

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