Current Property News: Aussie's willing to compromise on their idea of home

A survey by the Grattan Institute Think Tank shows there is a clear disconnect between the types of homes people want versus what is actually available.

More than 500 residents in Sydney and Melbourne were asked what type of home they would ideally like to live in, as well as asking them to make trade-offs when presented with realistic constraints such as housing costs and income. Their answers were surprising.

The report on the results, The Housing We’d Choose, confirmed that most still yearn for a large, detached house as expected. However, when constraints were factored in, more than half the respondents said they would prefer a semi-detached home (such as a terrace or townhouse) or apartment.

According to this report, it appears as though construction is still far too focused on building detached homes on the city fringes, with the report indicating there is more demand for medium density housing in the middle and outer ring suburbs.

"What we've been doing for the past decade is not going to get us any closer to the kind of mix of preferences that Australians say that they want," commented Jane-Frances Kelly of the Grattan Institute.

The results suggest that these cities, and most Australian cities for that matter, just do not cater for these changing needs. For example, semi-detached housing in Sydney and Melbourne makes up just 12% of the existing housing stock in both cities, a figure well short of the potential demand for such properties. 

Committee for Melbourne CEO Andrew MacLeod said the city had to address the shortage of high-density housing.

"This report clearly shows we would like the choice to live in different-style housing in our chosen areas. But those options simply don't exist, because of the push to keep our suburbs as they are," he said.

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