Summary
Housing assistance
is an Australia's welfare
topic
Australian and state and territory governments provide assistance to Australians experiencing difficulty finding or sustaining affordable and appropriate housing. Housing assistance refers to both access to social housing (such as public housing), and targeted financial assistance.
Social housing provides eligible households with rent set below market rates (based on a percentage of a tenant’s income). Social housing includes:
- public housing (rental housing managed by all state and territory housing authorities)
- community housing (housing managed by community-based organisations, available to low to moderate income or special needs households)
- state owned and managed Indigenous housing (housing provided and managed by state and territory governments available to households that have at least one member who identifies as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin)
- Indigenous community housing (housing that First Nations communities own and/or manage).
In some states and territories, community housing may include affordable housing.
For more information, see Housing assistance.
Social housing
At June 2024, there were around 452,000 social housing dwellings in Australia, up from 446,000 in 2023.
In 2024:
- most (322,000) social housing dwellings met the size requirements for the household composition.
- there were 60,900 (15%) dwellings that were considered to be underutilised and 22,600 (5.6%) dwellings that were considered to be overcrowded.
For more information, see Social housing dwellings and Suitability of dwellings
Social housing allocations
In 2024, there were around 426,000 households living in social housing, with around 830,000 occupants.
There has been a decline in the proportion of social housing households in Australia, falling from 4.7% of all households in 2013 to 4.1% in 2024.
In 2023–24:
- 33,600 households were newly allocated social housing (16,700 to public housing, 16,200 to community housing and 800 to state owned and managed Indigenous housing).
- 83% of new social housing allocations were households in greatest need, such as people experiencing or at risk of homelessness.
For more information, see Households and waitlists, and Entries, exits and transfers.
Financial assistance
Governments provide financial support to assist people on lower incomes to meet housing costs.
At June 2024, over 1.3 million income units were receiving Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA), similar to June 2023.
In 2023–24, 60,400 households in Australia received Private Rent Assistance and 32,000 households received Home Purchase Assistance.
For more information, see Financial assistance.
Figure SUMMARY.1: Housing assistance in Australia, by state and territory, 2024
The dashboard shows a summary of housing assistance in Australia and by state and territory. Data presented are available in the chapters of this report and data tables.
The interactive data visualisation displays a summary of key data about housing assistance in Australia at both national and state and territory levels. Data presented are available in the individual sections of this report and in the data download section. There were around 452,000 social housing dwellings in Australia at June 2024. Social housing households as a proportion of all households, remained stable nationally at 4.1% between June 2022 and June 2024 and has declined from 4.6% in June 2014. The number of households receiving Home Purchase Assistance decreased in 2023–24 compared with the previous year.