Housing is just too expensive in Australia for the young. To get a home at the lower end of the market one needs to stay away from auctions and be ready to go to the potential purchase as soon as it goes up for sale.
People panic at auctions. They put a whole day into it usually bring the family in tow. Once they have made the time and opportunity investment they really want the home and keep bidding against each other finally paying over the odds.
Already the young are making purchasing choices that are not what they originally planned. Buying further out of town and going into flats instead of separate houses is not what they had intended. However, they feel that they have to buy something, before or soon after marriage.
Only those with significant deposits are in the market now. In 1981, more than 60 per cent of people under 35 "owned" a home. Now it is under 50 per cent. In the 1980s the young could buy their ideal home. Today, they are buying something that they are not happy with: they are not content. Moreover, they are borrowing double the amount of the 1980s.
It is not easy to go to parents and beg for help with a deposit when you left home two years before on bad terms - such is the culture today. It is likely that young people buying homes now will enter retirement with many more years of mortgage repayments to go.
◆ Society by Ty Buchanan ◆
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