Vacant housing rates are rising in our major cities. Across Australia on census night, 11.2% of housing was recorded as unoccupied – a total of 1,089,165 dwellings. With housing affordability stress also intensifying, the moment for a push on empty property taxes looks to have arrived.

The key to the affordable housing industry’s future is that governments, in consultation with affordable housing providers, establish a clear industry vision with defined policy objectives, and specify medium-term growth strategies and targets to realise that vision. Whether involving new finance or the redirection of existing housing subsidies, government financial support is essential to complement...

Executive summary

This study examined the affordable housing industry’s current profile and capacity. The industry comprises non-government (for-profit and not-for-profit) affordable housing providers; and the institutional entities and individuals that enable, support and regulate the work of affordable housing providers. Providers range from commercial style operators to tenancy managers with organisational capacity closely aligned to scale and...

Four years after its announcement, the Queensland government last week cancelled the central plank in the Logan Renewal Initiative: the overhaul of Logan’s 4,900 public housing dwellings by a community-housing-provider-led consortium. The initiative is a planned 20-year strategy to reshape Logan, an outer-suburban centre in Brisbane’s southeast. It would have been Australia’s largest and most-ambitious...