ANZ has released a new report warning that unrelenting immigration-fuelled population growth will continue to make life difficult for aspiring first home buyers. From The AFR:
“The outlook for first home buyers is not encouraging… The probability of strong population growth and the presence of many potential first home buyers mean the market is likely to remain extremely competitive.
We have previously noted that stamp duty incentives are great for a lucky few, but such measures do little to address the underlying issues. It is difficult to envisage Australia’s supply-side response suddenly boosting the availability of affordable housing, so it looks like home ownership will remain a challenge for 20–34 year olds”.
…worsening affordability meant couples would be buying smaller homes at a later stage in life than previous generations…
We are continually told by the property lobby and the Coalition that the secret to housing affordability rests in liberalising planning and building more homes.
And yet Australia has just undergone the biggest dwelling construction boom in the nation’s history and this has been easily gobbled-up by unrelenting population growth driven by the federal government’s mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ agenda, which endeavours to force feed close to 400,000 people into the nation annually – equivalent to adding a Canberra’s worth of population every year – with the lion’s share of this growth flooding into the major cities.
Because of mass immigration, Sydney’s population is projected to grow by 87,000 people per year (1,650 people each week) to 6.4 million over the next 20-years – effectively adding another Perth to the city’s population:
Whereas Melbourne’s population is projected to balloon by 97,000 people per year (1,870 people each week) over the next 35 years to more than 8 million people:
The fact remains that it is a direct policy choice how ‘big’ Australia becomes, not a fait accompli.
As shown in the next chart, which comes from the Productivity Commission, Australia’s population will reach more than 40 million mid-century under current immigration settings, at least 13 million more than would occur under zero net overseas migration (NOM):
That’s a helluva lot of extra people to build infrastructure and housing for versus a lower or zero NOM policy.
Instead of hand-wringing over Australia’s housing crisis and inadequate infrastructure investment, how about politicians, policy makers and the media instead question Australia’s mass immigration settings, which are the demand-driver causing the problems in the first place? Why not argue to reduce immigration to sensible and sustainable levels?
Sadly, only the Sustainable Australia party has our interests at heart and is fighting the good fight on this matter.
