20 Sep Immigration and housing affordability – why immigration should be lower
Key Points:
- The key drivers of expensive housing in Australia have been low interest rates and a chronic housing supply shortfall.
- Thankfully Australian governments are now focusing on boosting supply, but this will face various constraints and more effort needs to be put into decentralisation.
- The role of high immigration levels (now about 500,000 per annum) can’t be ignored. On our estimates it needs to be cut back to nearer 200,000 people a year to line up with building industry capacity & to reduce the supply shortfall.