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The report, Locked out: the growing generational housing divide, was published by the Senate select committee on intergenerational housing inequity, chaired by Greens senator Barbara Pocock.
It found that home ownership among Australians aged 29 to 32 had fallen from 40.4 per cent for those born between 1970 and 1973 to 32.7 per cent for the 1990–93 birth cohort.
At the same time, the report found that housing had become significantly more expensive to earnings, with median dwelling prices having risen from around four times average full-time earnings in 1999–20 to around eight times in 2025–26.
This has flowed through to young peoples’ decisions, the report said.
Half of Australians aged 18-29 were living with their parents in 2024, up from 39 per cent in 2001. Of those who had moved out, two-thirds were renting privately, while 40 per cent of young renters in major capital cities were spending more than 30 per cent of their income on housing, up from 26 per cent in 2001.
“This Senate inquiry revealed a housing system stacked against younger generations who have lost the intergenerational housing lottery,” said Greens senator and Select committee chair Barbara Pocock.
“Millennials are the first Australian generation to be worse off than their parents.
“Young people have been ripped off, locked out of the growing housing divide, forced into insecure housing and, as a result, are delaying major life decisions.”
According to REA Group’s Housing Affordability Index, affordability fell to the worst level ever in FY2025–26, with a median-income household earning around $125,000 able to afford just 12 per cent of homes sold across the year.
Barriers to the home loan process
Some key parts of the home loan process were highlighted as contributors to the issue of housing inequity.
The Mortgage and Finance Association of Australia argued that duplication and administrative complexity can prevent or delay entry into the housing market.
“Brokers consistently see that improving how home loan application information is assessed by lenders would reduce delays, improve certainty and support more timely access to home ownership,” the association said.
“However, these challenges can extend beyond the home loan origination. Barriers to refinancing and switching can limit a borrower’s ability to respond to changing circumstances, including movements in interest rates.”
The Finance Brokers Association of Australasia (FBAA), meanwhile, identified access to credit as a primary hurdle for aspiring home owners, particularly lower-income earners without existing equity.
The association said low- and no-deposit schemes, alongside shared equity arrangements, could help address the challenge of saving a deposit while paying rent and meeting everyday living costs.
“Schemes that provide assistance to consumers to buy their first home remain the best ways to help those wanting to enter the market,” it said.
“Since saving a deposit is hardest for those on modest incomes where much of the salary goes to rent and fixed living costs, low/no deposit schemes are effective. Shared equity schemes are also effective.
“We support government continuing to offer these schemes and appropriately restricting eligibility so that they help those who need it without distorting the market.”
Indeed, schemes such as the expanded 5 per cent deposit scheme have been highly popular with first home buyers (FHBs), with applications having crossed 300,000 and the proportion of FHB loans coming from the scheme surging from around 25 per cent before expansion to 50 per cent afterwards.
The FBAA also added that costs such as lenders mortgage insurance, which the 5 per cent deposit scheme circumnavigates, could add additional costs for prospective buyers.
“Lenders mortgage insurance can be an extremely high-cost relative to the amount saved as a deposit for home buyers entering the market. Any mechanisms to help consumers apply more of their deposit to a home purchase and to avoid costs such as LMI will promote access.”
Proposed solutions
The report canvassed a range of proposed solutions, from tax and lending reforms to measures aimed at increasing housing supply and helping first home buyers enter the market.
A number of stakeholders called for further reform of tax settings, including negative gearing, capital gains tax discounts and stamp duty, to reduce speculative demand and improve access for owner-occupiers.
Housing campaign group Everybody’s Home argued that current settings “encourage speculative demand, reward the accumulation of multiple properties and inflate the value of existing housing assets”.
“Those already in the market benefit from rising prices and tax concessions. Those outside the market face ever higher barriers to entry,” the organisation said.
The Real Estate Institute of Australia (REIA) and REA Group both supported reforming stamp duty, with the latter arguing that a broad-based land tax could improve housing accessibility and affordability.
REA Group said the change “would improve housing accessibility and affordability and remove many inefficiencies in our housing markets and economy, while also delivering a more sustainable, efficient and broad-based source of state government revenue.”
The REIA called for nationally consistent alternatives to stamp duty that were broad based and less distortionary.
On the supply side, the Productivity Commission identified reforms to development approvals, regulation and innovation as ways governments could support the delivery of more homes.
The Housing Industry Association (HIA) also pointed to planning controls and lengthy approval processes as constraints on housing supply and costs, while calling for investment in infrastructure to support higher-density development and greenfield housing.
The Greens also tabled the introduction of “no-frills entry-level mortgages” to help borrowers in getting into the housing market.
Pocock said: “This housing crisis has been a long time in the making. Successive Labor and Coalition governments have delivered a housing system that caters to corporate greed, the banks, property developers and investors, not ordinary people looking for a roof over their heads.
“In the midst of a housing crisis, the banks have made enormous profits off the back of home loans. Over the life of an average 30-year owner-occupier mortgage, the big four banks make $229,000 in profit.
“To help get more young people into home ownership, the Greens want Australia’s big banks to be required to create no-frills entry-level mortgages for first home buyer owner occupiers to minimise their mortgage repayments in the initial years of their borrowing.
“Our large banks are amongst the most profitable banks in the world and they have been profiting from the financial stress of Australians for too long. It’s time the banks shouldered a fairer share of the costs facing younger generations entering home ownership.”
[Related: Four 2026 rate hikes deal $90k blow to borrowing capacity]
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