Great news on housing affordability PDF Print E-mail
Northern Rivers Social Development Council (NRSDC) has welcomed today’s Federal Government announcement of a significantly expanded the National Affordable Rental Investment Scheme and will be working hard to ensure that our region benefits from this much needed initiative.
The National Affordability Rental Scheme will create a new asset class of affordable rental properties to attract institutional investors to affordable housing development.

NRSDC President, Jenny Dowell, welcomed the initiative.

“What this does is make it attractive for developers to build homes for low and middle income households” Ms Dowell said. “Hopefully this will kick start an affordable housing development industry.”

“As home purchasers and home renters in our region well know, problems of housing affordability are not problems confined to our cities. Housing affordability has reached a critical point on the Northern Rivers, particularly in our coastal centres” Ms Dowell said.

The scheme involves an annual tax incentive of $6,000 per dwelling for up to 10 years and includes a State Government contribution of $2,000 a year per dwelling for the same period. Investors will build new homes and lease them to low-moderate income households at submarket rents. It is expected that 100,000 new houses will be built in the first 5 years of the scheme.

“Now we need to ensure that the Northern Rivers gets its’ fair share of investment” Ms Dowell said. “We are a high growth area and housing affordability in the region is as bad as or worse than most capital cities. We need to ensure that the benefits of this and other housing affordability initiatives extend beyond the cities to address the crisis that regions such as ours face.”

“NRSDC urges the government to ensure that affordable housing developers target regions such as the Northern Rivers.” Ms Dowell said.

Media Contacts
Jenny Dowell (NRSDC President) 0402 651 394
Tony Davies (NRSDC Chief Executive Officer) 0438 222 63
Trish Evans (NRSDC Affordable Housing Worker) 0447 212 245


Backgrounder – Affordable Housing in the Northern Rivers

Housing has been identified by NRSDC as a key regional priority given the critical links between accessible, affordable housing and economic growth, improved workforce participation, improved family stability and social inclusion.

Affordable housing refers to forms of purchasing or renting at a price or rent that is within the capacity to pay of low to moderate income households. 30 per cent of income measure is often chosen as a yardstick of whether or not housing is affordable. Housing stress is defined as being in the bottom 40% of income earners and paying more than 30% of income in housing costs.

By comparison to other regions in NSW, the North Coast of New South Wales has the highest concentration of people suffering housing stress. An acute shortage of affordable housing in the region is placing increasing strain on low and moderate income households causing many to relocate to other locations away from employment opportunities, friends and family. As well as losing existing sectors of the population, these high housing costs deter others from settling in the region which reduces growth opportunities and impacts negatively both economically and socially.
The region’s severe lack of transport options exacerbates these issues.

Access to affordable housing is particularly necessary for people who are not in the workforce and those working in key services on low-to-moderate incomes. These include workers in childcare and aged care, police, ambulance personnel, nurses, community development workers and transport workers.
Affordable housing contributes to economic growth within a region by:

• Providing a diverse and mobile supply of local essential workers;
• Containing upwards pressure on wages; and
• Attracting young entrepreneurial and skilled workers.

Social benefits that arise from providing appropriately located affordable housing include that it:

• Promotes family stability and the health and wellbeing of individual household members;
• Supports the educational attainment of children;
• Encourages workforce participation;
• Reduces travel time and costs for people otherwise displaced to distant areas to access affordable housing; and
• Promotes social cohesions and prevents problems of social and spatial exclusion that can affect low income households.

Our region includes the Local Government Areas of Ballina, Byron, Clarence Valley, Kyogle, Lismore, Richmond Valley and Tweed. Data shows that:

• Median rents in our region are higher than the state median
(Ballina, Byron and Tweed rents closer to Sydney rents)
• All areas have median incomes below the state median (25 -42% below)
• All areas have significantly less public housing than the State or National average
• The region’s rental vacancy rate is around 1%.

NRSDC’s Affordable Housing Project is working to maximise opportunities to increase the supply of affordable housing in the region and is working with local government, the government and not-for-profit housing sector to ensure that the region benefits from State and Federal Government initiatives such as the National Affordable Rental Investment scheme.