Anglicare has released its 13th annual Rental Affordability Snapshot for 2022, measuring both the availability and affordability of rental housing in Greater Sydney and the Illawarra.
This year’s Snapshot surveyed 45,992 rental listings across the country on one sample weekend.
Out of these 45,992 listings, the report found just eight rentals (0 per cent) that were affordable for a single person on the JobSeeker payment. There was one listing (0 per cent) in a share house that was affordable for a young person on Youth Allowance anywhere in the country.
For a couple living on the Age Pension, just 1.4 per cent of rentals were affordable.
An out-of-work couple with two children can afford just 78 properties across Australia, or 0.2 per cent of the rentals advertised on the Snapshot weekend. Single parents with a child on the Parenting Payment are able to afford just 61 (0.1 per cent) of the properties advertised on the Snapshot weekend.
For Parenting Payment recipients with two children, this drops to 20 properties (0 per cent). Single parents on Jobseeker can only afford nine of the listings on the Snapshot weekend (0 per cent).
The two drivers of rental unaffordability are low incomes and high rental prices, and the report stresses that both must be dealt with.
The report highlights how harsh the rental market is for young people on Centrelink payments. A person on Youth Allowance looking for a share house can afford one single room out of the tens of thousands of listings surveyed.
“Last year it was clear that even with Jobseeker, and the additional COVID-19 support mechanisms, affordable housing properties in the private rental market across Greater Sydney and the Illawarra were dwindling for those people with low income and relying on support," Anglicare CEO Simon Miller said.
"If ever there was further evidence that the NSW Government needs to provide a further tranche of Safe and Affordable Housing construction funding to relieve this housing crisis, this 2022 Snapshot provides it. The supply of safe, affordable and appropriate housing is conspicuously low, and that is a danger to low-income earners in our City.”
