Selling Australia

From The Herald Sun:

Million-dollar sales force up property prices

By Peter Familari
October 08, 2009 12:01am

FORGET the "for sale" sign, the new catch-cry in Melbourne's leafy suburbs is "duoshao qian".

Victoria's top real estate agents have begun hiring Mandarin-speaking salesmen to cash in on the property boom.

Translated, "duoshao qian" means "how much"? And it's a question being asked more than ever before, The Herald Sun reports.

Leading agents say more than 30 per cent of their stock is bought by families from mainland China.

"This calendar year 34 per cent of our sales went to mainly Chinese buyers compared to 15 per cent last year. We're up 125 per cent overall," Jellis Craig director Scott Patterson said.

"Demand is so strong we've got two native speaker agents starting next week."

Some agents say the boom grew when the Federal Government eased foreign investment rules on property last year.

"There's been an incredible surge from Chinese buyers since the rules for foreign ownership of real estate were relaxed by the Government to allow foreign citizens to buy established homes worth more than $300,000," buyers' advocate Mal James said.

"You could say that's the key driver and single reason for the property boom in Victoria especially for homes in the $1 million-$4 million range and it's also the catalyst for so many Chinese buyers."

Mr James says his clients are facing competition from cashed-up Chinese buyers, especially in Kew, Canterbury and Balwyn. There is also Asian interest in Toorak, Malvern and East Malvern.

He says the Chinese are attracted by areas with quality private schools.

The Asian buying spree is pushing up prices and adding to the housing shortage.

"There's no doubt it's adding about 15 per cent to prices and creating a shortage because the buyers are not selling out of an existing home," Mr Patterson said.

Australia permitted 4015 foreign investors to buy homes worth an estimated $2.97 billion in 2007-08, Foreign Investment Review Board research shows.

Victoria had the highest approvals of any state, soaring to 2238 last year, almost double that of the year before. A rise is expected for 2009.

Former plastic surgeon and financial planner Jin Shang will be Jellis Craig's first Mandarin-speaking agent from next week, and he can't wait.

"China is the world's strongest economy and Australia's major trading partner," he said.

"Chinese want residential properties here because they feel comfortable in Australia's multicultural environment and they know it has one of the world's best education systems."

Original article

This is how modern Australia, the "knowledge nation," makes a buck these days - selling its houses, along with its residency rights, to Chinese colonists err... investors.

"Chinese want residential properties here because they feel comfortable in Australia's multicultural environment and they know it has one of the world's best education systems."

So, the Chinese are not coming because they have any interest in the institutions, people, culture or traditions of Australia. No, they are coming because they want more comfort, better education services (courtesy of the Australian taxpayer), and a "multicultural environment" that allows them to surround themselves with fellow Chinese so that they never have to integrate into wider Australian society.

The Australian government, acting on behalf of its mates in the real estate industry, is effectively inviting foreign populations to move in and colonise parts of the country.

And, once again, Australians are forced to carry the costs. They have to compete with rich foreigners for housing in a country already facing a chronic housing shortage. They have to pay their taxes just so that wealthy Chinese can simply move in and make use of Australia's public services and infrastructure. They have to tolerate the creation of foreign enclaves within their cities, knowing that any objection, no matter how slight or reasonable, will result in them being labelled "xenophobic" and "racist."

This is the reality of life in modern Australia, a big piece of real estate up for sale to the highest bidder.

High immigration pushing out young Australian jobseekers

From The Australian:

THE Rudd government's alarm about retiring Baby Boomers causing economic growth to fall is unfounded and its policy response -- to bring in tens of thousands of overseas workers a year -- is wrong because of the rapid rise in over-55s staying at work.

According to a new report, a sustained increase in the labour force participation rate among men and women aged over 55 since the mid-1990s, continuing even as jobs are shed during the global economic downturn, should put a large question mark over the immigration program.

If immigration continues at current levels, the group most likely to suffer is young Australian jobseekers trying to enter the workforce, it concludes.

The report -- to be published next week by Monash University's Centre for Population and Urban Research in its People and Place quarterly -- concludes that, even if the net overseas immigration intake were halved from its current 180,000 a year between now and 2018, the labour force would grow by nearly a million workers, about two-thirds of whom would be over 55.

"The Immigration Minister's fear that, without continued, unprecedented high levels of overseas migration, the Australian labour force will soon contract is unfounded," the report concludes. "In the present economic environment of employment decline, sustained high levels of overseas migration are not necessary to ensure adequate labour force growth and such levels are compromising the employment prospects of younger job-seekers."

The report's author, CPUR social researcher Ernest Healy, told The Australian the Rudd government "appears to have been more alarmist than it needed to be in terms of population ageing and labour supply.

"The assumption by the government has been that all these Baby Boomers are going to retire and there will be this crisis of labour growth, but they simply don't seem to be retiring in the numbers the government has been expecting."

Full article

High immigration also adversely affects young Australians by forcing them to compete for entry into the housing market against new arrivals from overseas. Australia already holds the appalling position as the country with the highest house price to income ratio in the developed world, largely due to its massive immigration intake.

"Managing" growth

From On Line Opinion (Australia):

The ubiquitous rationale of growthism

By Tim Murray
Posted Monday, 29 June 2009

It’s uncanny. Two cities on two continents, but “growthists” in Vancouver and Melbourne seem to be reading from the same playbook.

Lance Berelowitz, an urban planner who chaired Vancouver’s planning commission, praised the Mayor’s so-called “Eco-Density” initiative as the answer to the city’s ever-increasing house prices. Given that between 800,000 to one million new residents are expected to come to Greater Vancouver in the next 25 years, it can be assumed that developmental pressures on the city’s limited land base will steeply drive up land costs. It follows then, that “housing prices in Vancouver will keep going up, unless we substantially increase the housing supply to match the ageing demand.”

For Berelowitz it is unconscionable that Vancouver, currently representing about 27 per cent of the metro area’s 2.2 million citizens, continues to throw up a kind of cordon sanitaire around its perimeter and not “shoulder its load” by accepting its share of growth. To do this he offers several European solutions to shove more innovative housing units into the area. But what is interesting about his plan is that he failed to mention Vancouver’s housing surplus. Between 1991 and 2006 Vancouver grew by 126,000 people who required 15,000 new dwellings to house them. But developers built 69,000 units. According to activist Randy Chatterton, judging from BC Hydro statistics, 18,000 units are unoccupied, and MLS listings are up 26 per cent while sales are down 10 per cent. Now there are seven unoccupied apartments for every homeless person in Vancouver.

“Accepting our share of growth” is a standard line of urban planners and politicians. What they never reveal is their role in not only accommodating growth but promoting it. Developers build houses on spec. They are built on the expectation that compliant governments will continue to provide international clientele (migrants) and the monetary and tax policy necessary to lubricate investment in real estate. It is a case study of Say’s Law - supply creates its own demand. Berelowitz never once thought to question the necessity for Vancouver to grow by 45 per cent in the next quarter century. He never thought to consult Dr Michael Healey’s landmark 1997 study of the Fraser Basin ecosystem that recommended a halt to immigration and a Population Plan to defend the region and others like it from runaway population growth. That’s because the ideology of urban planning is not growth-control but “growth management”.

Former real estate developer and media mouthpiece Bob Ransford recently “despaired” of those in Vancouver with, are you ready for this old chestnut, a “drawbridge mentality”, that is, “who think we can resist the global flow of population and somehow sustain our lifestyle”. One wonders what kind of lifestyle Ransford imagines for the Vancouverites forced to live like sardines in a sardine can just so more migrants can move in and buy the bachelor suite closets that his developer friends would obligingly sell them. It seems logical that the law of physics would place a limit on the process of densification that Berelowitz, Ransford and the Mayor would set in motion, but so far they have shown no apprehension of it. And the law of “livability” would surely fall well short of that physical limit.

One wonders how Ransford would behave if he were the last of ten passengers on an elevator that safety regulations set at ten. Would he hold open the door for more people in the lobby who wanted in because he feared being accused of “Nimbyism” or having a “drawbridge mentality”? Would he suffer an urban planner who insisted that the elevator could hold 12 or 15 people, or a real estate developer who sold tickets to more people than could safely ride on the contraption? Would he listen to a human rights advocate who said that every person of colour from another country had a right to jam on board regardless of the elevator’s carrying capacity because it was a matter of social justice? If it was a matter of profit, one suspects he would. Growthists can’t grasp the concept that existing passengers, existing residents, be they of a city, or a nation, have a moral right to set limits.

Ransford ices his argument with more tired clichés. Cliché number one: “Our kids will not be able to afford to live in a city where no new housing is built.” Trouble is “our kids” aren’t buying that new housing. In Greater Vancouver 85 per cent of new housing is occupied by immigrants, while 70 per cent of new housing in other Canadian urban centres is occupied by “new” Canadians.

Cliché number two: “If we halted growth we will have a real labour shortage with our rapidly ageing population.” Fact: the C.D. Howe Institute demonstrated that it would take an unsustainable immigration rate 28 times higher than its present rate for the next 50 years for Canada to maintain its present age structure. Postponed retirements and higher productivity will greatly lessen the impact of this over-hyped bogeyman.

Lastly, Ransford recruited the words of retired planner Peter Oberlander who said that compact settlement patterns were an inevitable feature of urban growth especially where we were committed to preserving agricultural land. “The city is humanity’s supreme achievement”, he maintained, in dismissing fears about continued growth. Apparently Oberlander never heard of the failure of “smart growth” in America or the compromise of British greenbelts by developers or he might be less confident in his “compact settlement patterns.” And when it is recalled that a Greek polis was ideally imagined to consist of 5,000 citizens, one shudders to think that today a city of five million is considered a “supreme achievement”.

In a speech that could have been ghost-written by any of the aforementioned Canadian growth-a-holics, Premier John Brumby of Victoria spoke of his government’s plan to “manage growth”, because you see, growth is inevitable, and growth projections must be treated as, if anything, “pessimistic”, i.e. conservative. Thus Melbourne is going to grow at least 44 per cent by 2030, with 6.2 million people by 2020. “Demographer Bernard Salt has projected we will regain our title (sic) as Australia’s largest city within 20 years.” Note that the Premier treats a population growth plateau like a sports trophy to be raised aloft in triumph. Melbourne will regain its “title” like Mohammed Ali regained his title against George Foreman. Similarly when Victoria was “losing” people in the 1990s, presumably the state of Victoria was a “loser”. But now “the exodus has been turned around and people are now voting with their feet in favour of Victoria”. It is as if Premier Brumby is fighting an election campaign and people moving to Victoria are casting a vote for him. A commonplace illusion among Premiers, Governors and Prime Ministers

But he does acknowledge the strain that in-migration places on infrastructure and states that a million extra residents will require 380,000 new houses or apartments. Given Melbourne’s growth rate, he projects only a 17-year supply of land, and housing affordability, planning and supply issues demand full attention. He confesses that “the faster we grow the greater the demand on land supply”. Yet the one option that Brumby will not consider of course is to lobby the federal government for a severe cutback on immigration. Out comes a variant of Canadian Cliché number two: “we are facing a skills gap of 123,000 jobs over the next decade, which could curb our ability to benefit from the climate change economy.” Victoria attracts 27 per cent of Australia’s skilled migrants, and Melbourne 25 per cent of migrants of all categories. It is curious that the Premier would think that the importation of workers would be key to fighting climate change, when research clearly indicates that the best climate change fighting strategy is reducing population growth.

Certainly the Vancouver experience leads one to question the party line of housing lobby groups that releasing more land is requisite to housing affordability. Australian Property Monitors operations director Michael McNamara argues that “demand for housing is extremely flat and developers haven’t been able to sell the projects that they’ve got, let alone launch new projects - so we totally dismiss the argument that releasing more land on our cities’ outskirts is going to affect affordability”. ANZ Bank senior economist Paul Braddick says “there is no strong evidence to suggest that a lack of land supply has been driving up prices. The proof of that is house prices have gone up across the board - indicating it is not just land availability that is the culprit here.” Macquarie Bank analyst Rory Robertson attributes the fact that city house prices have grown 75 per cent faster than wages in the past 20 years to a halving of interest rates, the halving of capital gains taxes in 1999 and massive immigration which chose to settle in the eight capital cities.

Of relevance here is a study done by Bob Birrell and Ernest Healy of Monash University in 2003 entitled Migration and the Housing Affordability Crisis. While the authors acknowledge that Melbourne’s housing price spiral “cannot be attributed to recent migration levels,” they qualify their statement with significant findings. “The impact of migration varies sharply by metropolis. For Sydney the share of household growth attributable to net migration in 2001-2002 is 47.8 per cent Migration makes the next biggest impact in Perth where it is projected to contribute 33.5 per cent of household growth, then Melbourne where it constitutes 28.6 per cent of growth in 2001-2002.” By 2021, however, migration will account for 63 per cent of Melbourne’s household growth.

“Developers and builders are already heavily dependent on immigration to sustain their activities in Sydney. Within a decade those operating in Melbourne and Perth will be dependant on immigration for nearly half the underlying household growth. This will apply to Australia as a whole by 2021 when 48.4 per cent of household growth will derive from overseas migration.” It is in this context that the idea advanced by population sociologist Sheila Newman that property developers are key lobbyists for the country’s ecologically suicidal policy of high immigration becomes very plausible. As Birrell and Healy state, “It is no wonder that the housing and property industries in Australia are so keen for high migration”.

That immigration has a crucial impact on housing affordability is not immediately apprehended in any correlation of housing price increases in six major Australian cities with a given volume of migrant settlers. From 1989 to 2002 Sydney increased 30.7 per cent, Melbourne 20.5 per cent, Brisbane 45.8 per cent, Perth 23.5 per cent Adelaide 28.1 per cent and Canberra 34.8 per cent. What must be understood, however, is while certainly investors and speculators played a major role in the housing price spiral, immigration boosted their confidence, and without that the spiral would never have taken off. That is why, Birrell and Healy explain, Sydney’s housing bubble remained the strongest, for even if immigrants demanded mainly rental accommodations, “this is still vital to investors if they are to fill their properties with tenants”.

“In the case of Sydney, the intuition of residents and some politicians that immigration is a factor in the housing affordability crisis, is correct. The absence of the immigration component of household growth in Sydney would significantly reduce the underlying gap between demand and supply. There is little doubt that a reduction in the national immigration intake would improve affordability in Sydney.”

The authors conclude by saying that “Immigration is an important underlying factor shaping growth in demand for housing prices because of its role in household formation … By 2021, according to our projections, the migration component of household formation in Sydney will be around 75 per cent, in Melbourne and Adelaide 60 per cent and in Perth 54 per cent”.

As a rule of thumb, according to Albert Saiz of the University of Pennsylvania, “an immigrant inflow of 1 per cent of a city’s population is associated with increases in average rent and housing prices of about 1 per cent .” (Journal of Economics, Volume 6, Issue 2)

By that token then, immigration has added 18 per cent to the price of Vancouver real estate, or to put it another way, it has reduced the supply of housing stock available to resident buyers and the price mechanism has adjusted accordingly.

The logic of growthism calls for an increase in supply, for more housing units through more density and/or the release or development of more land. The logic of common sense, however, calls for a decrease in demand, that is, a decrease in tax incentives for real estate investors and speculators and a reduction in migrants.

Whether it be Vancouver or Melbourne, throughout the Anglophone world, the issues are the same, cloaked in the same euphemistic code language of growthism. The choices are ours to make.

Tim Murray blogs at (We) Can Do Better. He is Director of Immigration Watch Canada, and Vice President Biodiversity Canada which he co-founded. Tim is a member of Sustainable Population Australia, the Population Institute of Canada and Optimum Population Trust UK. His personal blog is at sinkinglifeboat.blogspot.com.

Original article

Record immigration exacerbating WA's housing affordability crisis

From WA Today:

Immigrants put pressure on WA house prices

Vanessa Williams
September 25, 2008

Western Australia has seen the highest influx of immigrants in the nation, putting even more pressure on housing affordability, according to the Housing Industry Association.

Figures released from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show WA recorded the highest growth in Australia in the year to March, with 52,000 people flocking to the state.

HIA chief executive of policy Chris Lamont said the population growth led to less affordable housing.

"We need to look at the growth in population," Mr Lamont said.

"The mining boom is not going to continue and housing is going to be in critical demand."

The First Start shared equity program - a scheme whereby state government contributes to the home-buyer's mortgage - has been suspended due to a fund blow-out.

With Premier Colin Barnett not yet committing extra funds to the programme, Mr Lamont believed that the state government needed to urgently review the situation that many first home-buyers now faced.

He said one solution would be to reduce statutory charges with new housing.

"My suggestion to the WA state government would be to boost the supply of housing affordability and focus on supply," he said.

"However, it is a solution that will require both the state and the federal government to work together."

Original article

Massive immigration to worsen Sydney's housing shortage

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

Squeeze for homes worse than targets

Sunanda Creagh, Urban Affairs Reporter
October 2, 2008

A SOARING immigration rate means Sydney's suburbs will need to squeeze in a third more apartment blocks and houses than councils and government planners first thought - and that's on top of already ambitious development targets laid out in the State Government's 25-year city growth plan, says one of the state's top planning experts.

The Metropolitan Strategy - Sydney's blueprint for development - estimated in 2005 that the city would need an extra 640,000 dwellings by 2031 but a co-author of the report now says up to 876,640 will be needed.

"The numbers are somewhat alarming. It means we really do need to refocus our attention on how we will accommodate Sydney's growing population and we are not producing anything like the targets needed to meet this demand," Patrick Fensham, a director at SGS Economics and Planning, said yesterday.

"That will mean pressure on housing affordability, people staying at home longer, cramming in more bodies than people like to in the house. We need a policy response," said Mr Fensham.

SGS used the latest population projection figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics to calculate that up to 575,295 new units or houses will need to be built in existing suburbs over the next 23 years, while up to 301,345 new dwellings will be needed on greenfield sites in Sydney's outer areas. That is about a third more homes than the Metropolitan Strategy assumed would be required, said Mr Fensham.

Full article

Immigration debate needed

From ABC Unleashed:

Rudd's immigration policy doesn't add up

Ben Power
12 August 2008

Australia is finally starting to have an immigration debate. A number of commentators, including Michael Duffy, Paul Sheehan and Ross Gittins, have highlighted the Rudd (and previous Howard) Government's acceleration of the migrant intake.

As Paul Sheehan wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald, Rudd is "implementing the biggest immigration program since the end of WWII and the biggest intake, in absolute numbers of permanent immigrants and temporary workers, in Australia's history".

Before I go on, I have to make the usual disclaimer: this article is not arguing against immigration. It is not about the benefits of cultural diversity and the wonders of having 20 different restaurants in our main streets. This article is questioning why Australia's governments never fully outline the economic impact of significantly accelerating immigration.

The Rudd government has said, or indicated, its immigration boost is designed to combat a 'skills shortage' and inflation. But the economics of immigration is more complex; it is not just about broader economic gains, it is also about winners and losers. And it is about suitable timing given the state of the economy.

There is no denying immigration brings economic benefits, particularly if there are a high proportion of skilled migrants. Research shows that skilled migration does increase the well being of Australians; that is, boosts GNP per capita.

But the benefits are surprisingly, and disappointingly, small. This has also been found overseas. Harvard immigration economist George Borjas said the debate over immigration actually shouldn’t be about the economic benefits to a nation, as they "seem much too small". In the UK, a recent House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs report, The Economic Impact of Immigration, found the economic benefits of immigration were 'small or insignificant'.

According to Borjas, the debate over immigration numbers should be about winners and losers: "In the short run, it transfers wealth from one group (workers) to another (employers)."

The main mechanism through which the economy benefits from immigration is the lowering of wages by increasing the supply of workers. (While people focus on the impact on low-wage workers, a program with a high proportion of skilled workers will also keep down wages for a nation's existing skilled workforce). Some argue immigration doesn't lower wages, but if wages aren't lowered, then there is probably little economic benefit from immigration.

Cheaper labour costs eventually mean lower consumer prices... but also higher profits to business. That's one of the reasons business – particularly big business – is constantly calling for higher immigration. It is in the interests of business to talk up a 'skills shortage'. (Borjas also believes that productivity gains from skilled migrants – one of the biggest selling points – are "trivial in the context of the overall economy").

There are also other costs. The House of Lords report found immigration didn't just have a small negative impact on wages of lower-paid workers but also contributed to falling housing affordability – one of the major issues facing Australia.

In the current economic climate in Australia, perhaps the biggest issue is timing. The government is accelerating immigration as the economy and employment are weakening or set to weaken. Will Australians accept increasing competition for jobs when the economy is slowing?

Even if we accept that skilled migrant numbers are an economic boon, what are the justifications for the numbers we're targeting?

Given the economic benefits are surprisingly and disappointingly small, the fact the economy is slowing and inflationary pressures easing, the Rudd government needs to explain its justification for an acceleration in the immigration program. We hear little discussion about these issues in Australia. I haven't even touched on the impact of higher population on carbon emissions and water supplies.

The UK and US are having debates on the economic impact of immigration, and hopefully ours is starting. In recent times Australians have accepted higher immigration numbers. But in a gloomy economic climate that could change quickly if the government doesn't start convincing them why it is a good thing.

Source

Record immigration adding to Australia's housing crisis

From VOA News:

Record Immigration Adds to Australian Housing Woes

By Phil Mercer
Sydney
14 August 2008

Real estate experts warn Australia faces an acute shortage of affordable housing as immigration reaches record levels. There are estimates that Australia needs to build an extra 40,000 new homes a year simply to cope with current demand. From Sydney, Phil Mercer reports.

Australia opens its doors to about 300,000 new migrants next year as part of a plan to address a chronic lack of workers. That means the country will see its highest immigration flow in more than 60 years.

An army of temporary and permanent settlers will be granted visas as part of a government effort to sustain a decade-and-a-half of economic growth.

There are three major strands to Australia’s migration program: skilled workers, family reunions and humanitarian migrants.

The skilled component is at unprecedented levels, with qualified migrants being recruited in vast numbers from traditional areas including Britain and New Zealand, as well as emerging nations such as China and India.

In demand are accountants, engineers, computer professionals, health care workers and many workers in skilled trades, such as construction workers.

Such an influx of new migrants puts pressure on Australian society and has helped create a housing crisis as demand for inexpensive accommodation in major cities outweighs supply.

Demographer Bernard Salt says Australia is struggling to cope with the expanded immigration program.

“During calendar 2007 the Australian continent added 332,000 people,” Salt said. “Never before in our history have we added that number of people to our population base. 330,000 people per year is a rate and pace that we’re not really comfortable with. We’re used to growing at the 220, 230,000 per year. Our systems, our infrastructure, our culture can cope with that. We’re un-used to traveling at this pace.”

Thousands of Australians find it hard to buy or rent affordable homes, a problem exacerbated by decade-high interest rates, increasing land prices and taxes.

The government recently began a program to add 50-thousand rental properties for low-income earners to the market. Real estate experts, however, say it will take at least four years before such measures help make housing more affordable.

They say an average wage earner in Australia will struggle to buy an apartment or house in a country where housing inflation has been rampant in recent years, although does show some signs of easing.

The rental market, however, remains strong; a shortage of properties led to double-digit rent increases in the past year.

Source

Immigration VS. quality of life

From Crikey.com.au:

Skills crisis v. housing crisis

Adam Schwab
Thursday, 20 March 2008

Perhaps an editor at The Age has a sense of irony, or more likely, politicians have a poor sense of economics. Today the broadsheet led with a story on Labor’s plan to relax working visa rules to "fast-track thousands of temporary foreign workers... to tackle the skills crisis."

On page three, an alarming headline stated that the Melbourne rental vacancy rate was below one percent and that the "home drought worst on record." The rental vacancy rate near the Melbourne CBD is 0.5 percent.

Sydney and Melbourne are suffering through dire shortages of accommodation, transport is completely overloaded, hospitals crowded while much of the southern part of country is experiencing severe drought. Not to mention carbon emissions which don’t tend to drop with a higher population. While doing little to solve those difficult problems, the Government is in fact exacerbating them by encouraging additional migration.

Further, the Howard government’s legacy of economic incompetence is again becoming apparent with the much maligned "baby bonus" increasing to $5,000 per baby on 30 June. The vote grabbing baby bonus is so ill-thought out it is an insult to pork-barrelling. For a start, there is no need for Australia to organically boost its population given that our major cities are already overcrowded.

Second, a Canadian study noted that 90 percent of recipients of Canada’s similar bonus planned to conceive anyway, so it was literally a cash handout which could go towards a new plasma TV. Third, if it the Government wants to actually encourage growth, the bonus should increase for subsequent children, rather than remain a flat rate.

The policy of increasing Australia’s population, by migration and organically beckons the question – what is a more serious problem, the apparent skills shortage or Australian’s rapidly diminishing living standards?

Full article


More on the housing crisis:

Migrants push up house prices

Renee Viellaris
May 29, 2008 12:00am

THE Federal Government has admitted that battlers could be squeezed out of the housing market by tens of thousands of new skilled immigrants.

A Senate budget estimates hearing has been told the extra 31,000 permanent skilled migrants will compete with local people for a place to live.

But Immigration Minister Chris Evans played down the issue, saying more skilled migrants would boost the nation's low housing stocks in the long run.

The revelation is bad news for many Australians who have been squeezed out of housing and rental markets by rising costs and a shortage of properties.

In the lead-up to last year's election, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd campaigned on delivering more affordable housing.

Migration deputy secretary Peter Hughes said increasing the permanent skilled migration program - which will stand at 133,500 in the next financial year - would reduce inflationary pressures and cut the cost of housing.

But the answer was not good enough for NSW Senator Marise Payne, who asked: "Where are they going to live? We are underbuilding by 30,000 dwellings a year already in this country."

Full article

Questions for Kevin Rudd

From Sustainable Population Australia (SPA):

No Commitment to Sustainable Future by Rudd Government

Media Release 17 May 2008
Sustainable Population Australia

“With the announcement by Minister, Chris Evans, that Australia is opening its doors to a massive increase in unskilled migration, the last vestiges of any appearance that the Rudd Government is committed to environmental sustainability or social equity have been swept aside”, said Dr John Coulter, National President of Sustainable Population Australia (SPA), today.

“The total intake is planned to exceed 300,000, the largest intake since the migration scheme started in 1947 according to Minister Evans.”

Despite having been asked, Dr Coulter said that “Nowhere has the government answered the following questions:

• How does increasing our population by more than a million every three years make our climate change/greenhouse emission problem easier to solve?

• Every city in Australia is water stressed. How does increasing our population by an additional 5% every three years make our urban water problem easier to solve?

• It is doubtful whether in a climate changed, post peak oil world Australia can maintain water supply to its farmers. How does such rapid population growth make it easier to maintain our rivers, soils and food production?

• Australians have one of the highest per capita environmental impacts in the world. An increase in the Australian population has a larger global impact than the addition of a person just about anywhere else in the world. How does the Rudd Government morally justify increasing Australia’s demand on the global environment at the expense of many peoples far less well off?

• Australia has an acute housing shortage. More and more Australians cannot afford the rising price of a house or rent. One of the main drivers of this situation has been clearly identified as our already high immigration intake. How does Kevin Rudd justify making this situation even worse for ‘working families’?

• Australia has approximately 5% unemployment and another 5% of under employment. How does the Rudd Government justify bringing in unskilled workers when there are Australians unemployed and underemployed seeking work?

• There is a rapidly growing global food shortage. Increasing Australia’s population is leading to more and more high quality, well watered, food producing land going under housing and related urban infrastructure. Where is Kevin Rudd’s much advertised Christian morality?

Source

Australia facing immigration-induced housing crisis

From The Herald Sun:

Crisis in home building

John Masanauskas
July 01, 2008 12:00am

AUSTRALIA needs almost one million new homes over the next five years to accommodate the rapidly growing population, says the housing industry.

The Housing Industry Association said mass migration was driving up costs and failing to adequately plug skills shortages.

Victoria needed an extra 5000 houses above current annual production to meet demand, according to HIA data released yesterday.

HIA state executive director Robert Harding said that this translated to about 235,000 new homes over the next five years, with almost one million needed for the whole of Australia.

"Without a substantial increase in production there will almost certainly be a growth in the number of homeless, and further affordability woes," he said.

Mr Harding lashed out at record high immigration, saying federal government policy had to change.

"It's too big in the sense that it's not targeted," he said.

"We are not able to build to meet the demand of the present time, let alone the future demand the migration program is producing.

"We have spoken to the Government about a more targeted skills program, especially in relation to the building trades."

The Rudd Government recently announced an increase of 37,500 places in the 2008-09 program, bringing the total number of migrants and refugees to more than 200,000.

Full article

Immigration driving housing shortage

From ABC News:

One million homes needed to keep up with immigration: HIA

June 30, 2008

The Housing Industry Association (HIA) says housing supply is not keeping pace with Australia's booming immigration intake and one million new homes will be needed over the next five years.

HIA says there has been record immigration growth but no accompanying increase in housing.

The head of the association's policy division, Chris Lamont, says the problem is exacerbated because there has been a decline in the number of people per house.

He says he doubts the demand for housing will be met.

"The skills shortages that are plaguing the industry, limited land release and the limited investment are playing havoc," he said.

"In the five-year period that we're looking at, we're going to see continued house price growth and continued rental growth unless we make a sizeable difference in combating the demand."

Source

Kevin Rudd's immigration plan

From The Independent Australian:

Chairman Rudd’s Secret Weapon

Editorial
The Independent Australian
Winter 2008 - Issue No. 15

Much has been written about the effect of the Budget on inflation. The general consensus of opinion seems to be that if the ALP were going to honour their election promises, the Budget would be more or less neutral. However the Government and the Reserve Bank are clearly worried about inflation in view of the rise in commodity prices, which are determined overseas.

They fear that there will be a wage breakout, forcing up prices, especially since they are repealing WorkChoices and relaxing pressure on the unemployed to get a job.

Their solution is to flood the country with a record number of immigrants (up nearly 40,000 to nearly 200,000) and temporary work visas, increasing the competition for jobs, forcing up unemployment and hence deterring workers from seeking higher wages. The Budget papers allow for an increase in unemployment and for a decrease in the wage share of GDP from 47.9% to 45.9%.

The media in general has not drawn attention to the significance of the policy, but there has been strong approbation from big business. A few unionists on the Left have expressed alarm. Most of them are silent, supporting the party ahead of the best interests of their members.

The social effects are of no concern to Chairman Rudd, headline interest rises are his major worry. Where are all the immigrants to live? Housing starts have fallen, rental accomodation vacacy is at the lowest in living history. Desperate seekers are bribing estate agents. In the middle of all this we have touching features about Chairman Rudd cuddling up to the homeless. Concern is no substitute for action. The main reason for homelessness is lack of accomodation for them at anything resembling affordability. Older houses in around the city that used to provide rooms for the homeless are being pulled down for blocks of units to house all the newcomers.

The Infrastructure Fund will allegedly help with the transport and other bottlenecks that Australia is experiencing. But it won’t start spending for a year or so and capital works like these take time to implement. In the meantime ordinary Australians will have to put up with crowded public transport, choked roads and clogged health services.

Now is the time to buy a rental property. With housing starts in decline and record immigration, rental rates must go up further. Tough on long standing Australians who can’t afford a house, but when did the ALP ever care about them? Uppermost in the minds of ALP long term planning is that immigrants tend to favour the ALP.

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