By Chris Zappone
The dramatic revision to Australia's population estimates will aggravate the nation's chronic shortfall of available housing, increasing the urgency to build more homes, an industry group said today.
In a report released this week, the Treasury estimated there will be 35 million people in Australia by 2050, 20 per cent higher than previous estimates.
That means 70,000 new homes will have to be built a year to accommodate the population growth, the Housing Industry Association said today.
"Already Australia has a substantial gap between the supply of dwellings and the underlying demand for dwellings," said HIA deputy managing director Shane Goodwin. "The gap is set to widen further with obvious consequences for house prices, rents and affordability."
Before the revisions to Australia's population estimates, HIA estimated the shortfall between underlying demand and supply of homes to hit 56,600 in 2009.
In its June quarterly state and national outlook, the HIA estimated 186,100 homes would be needed in 2009 but expected only 129,500 would be built.
In 2010, Australia’s underlying requirement would rise to 188,000, and in 2011 it is expected to edge up to 190,000. On HIA numbers, the industry would struggle to keep pace with that demand, with estimates 139,200 homes would be built in 2010 and 158,000 in 2011.
The HIA represents the residential building sector and its members include contractors, builders, and suppliers.
Mr Goodwin said the housing shortage may eventually turn away the skilled migrants the Government is counting on to populate Australia.
"We’re competing with other countries for these (skilled migrants)," he said.
"For example, they can go to Canada and not face the same difficulties in getting housing."
"Not only will there be a greatly increased demand for accommodation, Australia is faced with further strains on urban infrastructure, health and education to meet expected increases in population," said Mr Goodwin.
"Much of the responsibility for the funding and delivery of services in these areas falls on state and territory governments, which will face additional budgetary pressure to accommodate the extra population."