Australia named a top ‘forever renter’ nation as house prices outpace incomes

Australia has been named among the world’s top ‘forever renter’ nations, with new research revealing house prices have grown almost 22 per cent faster than incomes in just a decade. The widening affordability gap places Australia 15th out of 39 OECD countries in the Forever Renter Global Index, which examined where long-term renting is becoming increasingly entrenched as homeownership slips further out of reach. RELATED: Lazy tax: Shock move as Aus banks slash rates A home leased in Geelong, Victoria. The research by furniture retailer Luxo Living using the OECD Affordable Housing Index analyses the proportion of renters and homeowners alongside housing costs, overcrowding, and changes in house prices relative to incomes. Australia recorded a score of 48.1 out of 100, narrowly ahead of the United States on 48, but it was the deterioration in housing affordability that stood out. Australia’s house price-to-income index has climbed to 121 from a baseline of 100 in 2015, meaning property prices have risen almost 22 per cent faster than household incomes over the period. That was the sixth-largest gap among the 31 countries for which comparable price-to-income data was available. Austr...