Duplexes could be key to solving housing crisis
Developing just a fraction of single-occupancy homes in Australian cities into duplexes would be enough to eliminate the nation's housing shortfall.
AUSTRALIA is falling further behind on its housing supply targets, as experts urge the states to slash restrictions on duplexes and low-rise apartments.
The Committee for Economic Development of Australia on Tuesday called for Australia to allow more medium-density homes to be built in middle-ring suburbs.
The think tank released a report that found that if just one-in-four standalone homes in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth were developed into dual occupancies, it would increase housing supply by nine per cent or nearly a million dwellings.
Economist estimates of Australia’s housing shortfall range from 200,000 to 300,000 homes.
The federal government’s National Housing Accord has set a target of 1.2 million new homes by mid-2029, but current approvals are falling well short of the required run rate.
Building consents fell 6.4 per cent to 15,832 in October, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported on Tuesday.
That’s below the 20,000 per month rate required to meet the target.
The drop was driven by a 39.2 per cent decline in apartment approvals.
Apartment approvals are particularly volatile and fluctuate wildly each month, but the trend line has barely increased for the past 12 months.
Housing Minister Clare O’Neil said the federal government was slashing red and green tape to speed up approvals.
A “strike team” of bureaucrats established to clear a backlog of housing projects held up by environmental laws had ticked off on 14,000 homes – out of a total of 26,000 – since the government’s economic roundtable in August.
“We have a housing crisis in this country because for 40 years we just haven’t been building enough homes. Speeding up the time it takes for a housing project to get approved is going to make a big difference to that,” Ms O’Neil said.
“It’s simply too hard to build a house in Australia today. There are endless layers of bureaucracy across three levels of government to wade through before builders can lay a brick.”
Efforts to address housing affordability have focused excessively on the extremes of high-rise apartments or large houses on the suburban fringes, CEDA senior economist Danika Adams said.
“But ‘gentle density’ can deliver more housing in middle-ring neighbourhoods where people want to live, while making better use of existing infrastructure and transport networks,” Ms Adams said.
The report urged governments to copy planning reforms undertaken in Auckland nearly a decade ago.
Changes to zoning laws that abolished single family zoning and allowed medium-density housing across three-quarters of the city resulted in an estimated 50 per cent increase in building consents within five years.
House prices were 15 to 27 per cent lower than what they would have been without the reforms.
State governments, particularly in NSW and Victoria, have introduced reforms to streamline approvals processes and allow for increased density around transport hubs.
But Australian cities still rank among the least dense in the world.
Allowing dual occupancies and apartments up to six storeys across a broad swathe of middle-ring suburbs would reduce commute times and improve affordability more effectively than simply allowing for high-density apartments in a select few areas, CEDA found.
On Monday, property research firm Cotality revealed dwelling values grew another one per cent in November, with Brisbane becoming the second Australian city to smash the $1 million median home price barrier.
