Australia's housing woes may not be unique, but they are extreme, from unaffordable property to rising rents and a critical shortage of dwellings.
But experts say the solutions aren’t a mystery – they already exist and have been tried and tested around the world for decades.
From Singapore to Finland and Canada, a number of nations have employed radical reform agendas and deployed ambitious solutions that have had a meaningful impact on affordability and supply.
They’re effective learnings that Australia could adopt now, according to Brendan Coates, economic policy program director at the Grattan Institute.
"There's a number of different things we need to do, and we can draw inspiration from different parts of the world for each."
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The answers to Australia's housing woes exist - and they've been tried and tested elsewhere. Picture: Getty
Canada’s approach – create a solid national plan
Hal Pawson, professor of housing research and policy and associate director of the City Futures Research Centre at UNSW said a housing crunch is a bit like an oil tanker.
"It's very hard to turn around," Professor Pawson said. "It takes a long time and decisions that you make today around planning and investment aren't going to generate anything on the ground for several years."
Solving Australia’s housing woes needs strategy at a federal level, he said, but "Australia hasn't had anything that takes the form of a national plan”.
Canada implemented an AU$80 billion, 10-year housing strategy. Picture: Getty
Canada is one of the few countries in the world that has a properly spelled out national housing strategy, Professor Pawson says.
It's a good example for Australia because the country has a similar system of governance between its federal level and provinces, a similar economic structure, and is also geographically spread out.
Implemented in 2017, the 10-year plan aims to build new affordable housing, modernise existing housing, and better support the community housing sector at a cost of C$70 billion (AU$80 billion).
The good thing is the plan is properly costed and funded and includes grants for lower income earners as opposed to loans, he said.
Canada was in the grips of a housing crisis when its reform agenda was announced. Picture: Getty
Although, it remains quite narrow and doesn't integrate home ownership very explicitly, he conceded.
"A plan in Australia should incorporate what governments can do to support first-home owners, as well as those who are under rental stress or homeless."
New Zealand’s approach – relax planning rules to encourage intensive housing
To combat a chronic housing shortage, Auckland decided in 2016 to upzone about three quarters of its inner-suburban land, removing single dwelling restrictions to enable more development.
Since then, the move has led to the construction of 26,000 new homes, or “approximately 5.07% of the dwelling stock of the Auckland region", a study by Yale researchers Ryan Greenaway-McGrevy and Peter C B Phillips found.
Mr Coates said the simplest way to reduce housing costs in Australia would be to build more, but planning rules remain a constraint.
"Having more flexible zoning, allowing housing to be built in more places, or increasing density limits would help enormously," he said.
"A 5% increase in housing stock compared to where we otherwise would’e been would be enough to bring down prices and rents in Australia by something like 12.5%."
New Zealand's reform program has built 26,000 homes in Auckland alone so far. Picture: Getty
Singapore’s approach – make the government a developer
The Singapore Government's Housing and Development Board has provided subsidised and high-quality housing for about 80% of the city-state's residents.
Australia actually did something similar in the 1950s and 1960s, when state and territory governments developed properties to help first-home buyers get into the market.
Professor Pawson believes it's time to revisit that policy.
"If government agencies take on a house building role, they can do that without needing to allow for profit. So, at least in theory, they are able to produce newly built housing that they could sell at a lower price."
Singapore provides housing for about 80% of the population. Picture: Getty
But Mr Coates said it would be tricky to replicate the policy in Australia, where the Commonwealth owns a much smaller percentage of land.
"If the Australian Government owned more of the land, it'd have a lot more resources to put in play to make sure no one went without a home."
Finland’s approach – shared ownership and more social housing
Finland is recognised globally as a good practice example of how to manage homelessness.
Its Housing First policy has provided 60,000 housing units, of which 48,500 are subsidised for rental housing.
The number of homeless people has continuously declined from about 20,000 in the 1980s to about 4000 today.
In Australia, more than 116,000 people were estimated to be homeless on Census night in 2016, with more on the brink. The next round of data from the 2021 Census will almost certainly show a much higher number now.
Finland's approach will see it effectively end homelessness in the country. Picture: Getty
Mr Coates says Finland's Housing First approach policy you can solve homelessness.
"We need more social housing, but we also need more affordable housing. It really is a question of political will. And it would not necessarily be that expensive."
The northern European nation also has an innovative approach to homeownership, Professor Pawson says, with buyers able to share ownership with the government.
"This provides a steppingstone to full home ownership for people whose income wouldn't allow them to become full owners."
This is something Australia has already offered in some states, and the Federal Government's proposed Help to Buy Scheme is expected to be underway next year.
Germany’s approach – empower tenants, reform land tax, encourage institutional investment
Germany has taught the world that renting doesn't have to be unattractive.
A much larger proportion of the German population rent than in Australia and tenancies are much more secure, which in turn eases pressure on the purchasing market.
Rental reform in Australia would help to enhance renters' rights, but there is huge resistance.
Our tax system is geared towards property ownership, making it attractive for mum and dad investors to own rental properties but uneconomic for superannuation funds or institutional investors.
"Existing owners are going to resist a change in tenancy laws really strongly because you're pushing that risk of a bad tenant onto them, and that's really costly," Mr Coates said.
Germany's approach has largely made renting affordable, stable, and fair. Picture: Getty
The answer is reforming land taxes to get more institutional investors into the market, he said.
"In Germany, a lot more of the rental stock is owned by the state or by cooperatives and not-for-profits, which are better placed to manage the risk of getting a bad tenant because they're sharing that risk across 1000 or 10,000 homes."
Mr Coates said there's no reason why the Australian Government can't become a "landlord of choice" over time, buying land, building housing, or buying properties to be rented out at market rate.
"If it did that, it's not making a loss, it's making a profit."