By any measure, the housing market is a major sector in the Australian economy. Since the mid-1990s, housing prices have consistently outstripped income growth, the national home-ownership rate has fallen by 4% and the ownership rate for under 35s has collapsed, building in structural problems for future decades.

Unfortunately, large system scale does not seem to have led to big thinking in designing policy and strategy for the national housing market and this contributes to problematic outcomes. For households, pervasive problems of affordability keep spreading up income and age ranges and the prospect of home-ownership for young Australians has been damaged by present policy approaches.

Key recommendations:

• The establishment of a Royal Commission on Housing Future Australia
• The expansion of RBA formal accountabilities to include housing market stability
• The establishment of a permanent Housing Committee as part of the National Cabinet
• The development of a national housing strategy by the Commonwealth Government, including a housing market strategy
• The establishment of a national housing agency under Commonwealth Treasury with specialist policy capability to champion actions to achieve effective housing-economy outcomes, to promote affordable housing development and to re-create the analytical capacity of the former National Housing Supply Council