Are ‘Housing Supply Deals’ the way forward?

“As our borders reopen and our population begins to grow again, we will need to unlock new housing supply if we are to help support housing affordability outcomes for the community,” he explained.

Mr Morrison weighed in on the Property Council’s recommendations, stating that home affordability in Australia cannot be addressed without also addressing supply.

He said: “The Federal Government can help smash supply bottlenecks by striking Housing Supply Deals with state, territory and local governments. Under these deals, federal and state infrastructure funding can be added to the industry’s own contributions to clear out the infrastructure and planning logjams to deliver the housing the community needs.”

Mr Morrison pointed out that housing affordability is a national issue, thus, the federal government needs to play a stronger role in the solution whilst state and local governments bear the responsibility in its implementation.

He also added that the ‘Housing Supply Deals’ may help overcome the infrastructure and planning hurdles blocking the delivery of new housing and may help ease housing prices.

As an example, he mentioned how NSW and Queensland are struggling to meet demand for new houses that are affordable to first-time buyers, and, he believes, federal assistance might help break the cycle.

“With net overseas migration recommencing as international borders reopen, this is the right time to undertake some of the bold reforms needed to unlock sections of land in growth corridors of our largest cities and towns,” Mr Morrison stated.

Data presented by the Property Council shows huge supply gaps in key detached housing markets across Australia, and it has argued that state government incentives are needed to avoid an impending apartment supply bottleneck by 2025 in the main capitals.

The Commonwealth should make federal funding support for social and affordable housing conditional on meeting key housing supply targets, according to the Property Council.

Mr Morrison relayed that the housing industry would like the Federal Government to add incentives on supply, zoning, and planning reforms in order to help states meet their housing duties.  

This can be done through the inclusion of metrics in existing arrangements and an expert taskforce should be established to develop a National Competition Policy-style payment plan for states that meet their long-term responsibilities.

In closing, Mr Morrison stressed the key role of the Federal Government in the housing industry:

“As shown through the strong work of NHFIC, the Federal Government does have an influential role to play monitoring and spurring better state and local government support for our long-term national housing supply needs.”