places people want to live"?
Take this from Plan for Victoria: #housingtargets will "improve housing #affordability for you by delivering different types of homes at a range of prices, particularly in areas where you want to live."
So the solution to homes being so plentiful and affordable that everyone can suddenly live exactly where they want is having targets. Amazing.
🪄Well of course not – it's more magical planner thinking.
Broad targets unaccompanied with what kind of homes, what configurations, what proportions, and what price ranges they will deliver across different contexts, are worthless.
Now, of course there are other measures proposed, particularly streamlining certain planning approvals for some types of dwellings.
I'll keep saying it until the message is heard: lack of zoned land is not why our cities have failed for decades to meet density and consolidation aspirations. Cost, prices and preferences are the barriers, not planning.
🏡Planning is only a barrier to getting more middle-ring and greenfield going from a lack of zoned & serviced land supply.
There is a preoccupation with fixing something which isn't broken whilst avoiding the hard things which would actually make a difference to #housingsupply .
Infrastructure Victoria propaganda may convince some to spend ~$700k to ~$1m for a new 1-2 bed apartment for lifestyle which is perfectly fine.
But the same family is unlikely to upgrade to a new 3 or 4 bedroom apartment due to cost relative to other options.
Homebuyers are great at working out what they want given personal affordability levels and need. They have overwhelmingly chosen homes or townhomes in newer suburbs, no matter how much that angers planners and pollies.
They deliver better "bang for buck" than equivalent new apartments, and this gap has only grown in recent years, not diminished. A longer commute doesn't offset the benefits.
🏢If people wanted more apartments to live in and could pay the freight, guess what? Developers would build them hand over fist.
Yet 1000s of completed units are remain unsold in a #housingcrisis – in good projects, many below prices developers would need to charge to make a new project #feasible. They are not flying off the shelves mostly because they don't represent (relative) value compared to old units or other options.
Until those units are sold and the market accepts new price levels at scale, developers won't push on with new projects.
~8000 apartments were completed in Victoria in 2024 according to Charter Keck Cramer, with 3000 #buildtorent. The Victorian Government needs 50,400 infill units per year based on 70:30 targets.
🤔Not accepting basic #economics is not the way to solve this wicked problem.