Australia’s baby boomers have easily the highest rate of home ownership, which stands at around 80%. Most baby boomers also own their homes outright.
For younger Australians, who have seen their homeownership rates collapse, the situation is completely different.
Those that do enter the housing market have been left paying jumbo-sized mortgages as they forever chase home prices higher.
The Australia Institute released polling of 1,009 Australians between 13 and 15 November 2024, seeking their attitudes to future property prices.
The polling showed that about as many Australians want property prices to decrease in the future (36%) as want them to increase (33%). One in five (18%) want them to stay the same.
The polling was predictable in that the majority (59%) of those who own investment property want house prices to rise, whereas few (12%) want prices to fall.
More home-owning Australians want property prices to rise rather than fall. By contrast, renters overwhelmingly (60%) want property prices to fall.
Interestingly, those who own outright—primarily baby boomers—believe most strongly in rising property prices (45%) and overwhelmingly do not want to see property prices fall (18%).
The above data also helps to explain why politicians rarely implement policies aimed at lowering house prices.
There you have it.
The Albanese government does not want housing prices to fall at all.
Source: https://t.co/EmndvZlkhg pic.twitter.com/ZDqYVsvU13
— Tarric Brooker aka Avid Commentator 🇦🇺 (@AvidCommentator) December 10, 2024
“We want to bring house price growth into something sustainable. So we are not trying to bring down house prices”, Housing Minister Clare O’Neil told JJJ’s Hack this month.
“We want to see sustainable price growth… Our government’s policies are not going to reduce house prices and we want house prices to grow sustainably”, she said.
The electoral math is such that only around one-third of Australians rent and are directly disadvantaged by rising home prices.
Moreover, as shown above, only 36% of respondents want to see property prices fall.
Ultimately, Australian politicians policies on housing reflect voter preferences. They don’t want property prices to fall.
