Justin has $300,000 in the bank but can't get a home loan
A 2024 report by Swinburne University of Technology found about 508,000 people aged 55-plus were at risk of 'non-supported housing precarity' in 2019-20 – neither poor enough to qualify for housing assistance nor wealthy enough to buy.
'The problem is, after they go through that first hurdle of being approved by the government, they have to find finance from the bank … which introduces its own restrictions about not lending to older people,' say report co-authors Dr Piret Veeroja and Professor Wendy Stone.
'The governments can provide the settings, regulations and the motivation for the finance sector to reduce its discrimination against older people … really bringing the financial sector on board is a necessary part of the puzzle,' Stone says.
Stone says shared equity schemes can work well for some, but older applicants they've spoken to who may be eligible face more complex hurdles.
Stone says the aged pension rate is 'set on the assumption that people don't have that large housing cost in retirement'.
'But it's impossible to afford a mortgage or find anything that's affordable in a private market on that payment,' she said.
Sally Tindall, Canstar's data insights director, says the government could 'work out a scheme … [where] the bank is happy to take on additional risk for someone over 55.'
She says government is canvassing solutions, including a reverse mortgage program and abovementioned housing initiatives, but says Help to Buy is 'probably geared towards younger Australians'.
'It could be a good avenue for all Australians, but more needs to be done,' she says. Tindall says the low uptake of the Family Home Guarantee, which offers 2 per cent deposit and requires a bigger loan, suggests it is not fit for purpose.
'People over 55 who don't have a steady stream of income and an exit strategy are not passing the banks' serviceability test, and the banks can't waive those tests because it's a lot more risk for them.'
When ex-police officer Naomi Oakley, 56, divorced nine years ago, she had no savings and was raising three children on one wage. After years of saving, she had $70,000; she applied for a home loan and was rejected. She was devastated.
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She eventually purchased a three-bedroom unit in Skye, outer south-eastern Melbourne – further from the city than she wanted and far from family and support networks.
'I don't go out for dinner and … getting my hair done is a luxury – you have to give up those small things to have a loan at my age,' Oakley says. 'I also think, 'oh god, I'm in my mid-50s, will I get ill before I pay it off?' But you just have to be positive.'
A federal government spokesman says Labor's Help to Buy scheme 'will help Australians get into home ownership with as little as a 2 per cent deposit, and a much smaller mortgage – an important option for those who might need a shorter mortgage term'.
'For older renters, we're making renting more secure with 80,000 long, five-year lease rentals and through our Better Deal for Renters, which is ending no-grounds evictions and rent bidding,' he adds.
Brendan Coates, a retirement income expert at Grattan Institute, says Help to Buy is only useful for wealthier renters on the brink of purchasing.
'It's useful for older renters who will often have a deposit but won't have enough time left in the workforce to pay off the loan,' he says. 'Most renters have less than $100,000 in savings – there's no way they can buy a home, particularly if they're approaching retirement.'
Raising rent assistance by 50 per cent for singles and 40 per cent for couples should be a priority, Coates says.
Shadow Minister for Housing and Homelessness, Andrew Bragg, said: 'The only way to increase home ownership is to boost housing supply. Under the Coalition, Australia was averaging 190,000 new homes per year. Under Labor, we're barely hitting 170,000 new homes per year.
'Labor's Home Guarantee Scheme is almost useless for many mature first home buyers who will be told 'no' by their lender.'
Flowers hopes he can eventually buy something, even if it's to leave to his kids.
'I grew up hearing about Australia the lucky country – doesn't feel too lucky to me, and it won't be like that for our children.'
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Sydney Morning Herald
3 hours ago
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Little wonder then, that after an election period, people are taking stock of their lives, deciding they want to see their families, or go on holidays and figuring out an escape route. Quitting after the election also makes financial sense. Under the law for parliamentary staff, those who leave their jobs during an eight-week window after the election can walk away with a severance package five times what they'd otherwise get. It is 'life-changing' money, one former Labor staffer says. And life outside politics can be even more lucrative. Loading While some staffers are seeking to become members of parliament, many former aides instead find jobs in government relations, lobbying or public relations that often pay better than what the Commonwealth pays MPs, let alone staffers. A ministerial chief of staff in federal politics will generally earn around $250,000 a year, for example, with senior advisers taking home around $170,000. 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3 hours ago
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In past years, Coalition staff have done the same thing, capitalising on their ties to former colleagues still in government. The opposition's smaller ranks after the most recent election mean many staff have involuntarily lost their jobs too. But the recent departures from government show the flow to the private sector is bipartisan. When Katharine Murphy, a press gallery veteran and long-term political editor of the Guardian Australia joined Albanese's office as a press secretary last year, it appeared to be a coup for the prime minister's team. But in June, Murphy – who was well-liked by her former colleagues in the media – left her post with the government. Albanese also lost another high-profile recruit from the press gallery, former Channel Ten reporter Stela Todorovic. Other departures from the prime minister's office include advancer Prue Mercer, strategic communications director Katie Connolly, senior advisers Phoebe Drake and Lachlan McKenzie and media adviser Irene Oh. All up, more than 10 people left Albanese's team of around 50. Despite recent departures, the prime minister's office said a majority of staff across the government were female. The departures haven't been limited to the prime minister's office either. Penny Wong lost her long-term chief of staff Thomas Mooney – rumoured to have ambitions of a political career in South Australia – and media boss Caitlin Raper. Health Minister Mark Butler's chief of staff Nick Martin is gone. Brigid Delaney, a popular former Guardian columnist and co-creator of the hit Netflix series Wellmania, who has worked as a speechwriter for Labor frontbenchers Katy Gallagher and Tanya Plibersek, left to focus on her own media career. Plibersek's chief of staff Dan Doran has moved on, as has Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth's deputy chief of staff Lanai Scarr, a one-time political editor for the West Australian. 'This job is brutal,' said one former staffer, echoing numerous others who sometimes used more colourful language. One former senior staffer working in the corporate sector said that while working in politics, she would often pull 75- to 100-hour weeks. Life in the private sector is a comparative breeze. Those hours are consistent with working under both Labor and Coalition MPs. The 2021 Jenkins review into parliament's workplace culture found stressed and overworked employees were a risk factor for inappropriate behaviour and creating a toxic work environment. There have been several high-profile workplace cases in the years since, but the Albanese government has created an independent Parliamentary Workplace Support Service to assist staff and a parliamentary standards commission to confront bad behaviour by MPs. The former staffers mentioned in this piece either declined to comment or did not respond to a request for comment, but in either case there is no suggestion they were exposed to a toxic work culture. The long hours are often a product of ministers and staffers trying to manage the demands of politics, the media, and policy reform at the same time. Ryan Liddell, a former chief of staff to ex-Labor leader Bill Shorten, says the pressure to be constantly plugged in makes living a regular life challenging. 'As a staffer you normalise things like spending Christmas lunch on the phone to the boss while your family hands you beers,' says Liddell now running his own government relations firm Principle Advisory. 'You basically lose track of the weekends. On Sunday, you might wake up at 6.30am instead of 5.30am.' Little wonder then, that after an election period, people are taking stock of their lives, deciding they want to see their families, or go on holidays and figuring out an escape route. Quitting after the election also makes financial sense. Under the law for parliamentary staff, those who leave their jobs during an eight-week window after the election can walk away with a severance package five times what they'd otherwise get. It is 'life-changing' money, one former Labor staffer says. And life outside politics can be even more lucrative. Loading While some staffers are seeking to become members of parliament, many former aides instead find jobs in government relations, lobbying or public relations that often pay better than what the Commonwealth pays MPs, let alone staffers. A ministerial chief of staff in federal politics will generally earn around $250,000 a year, for example, with senior advisers taking home around $170,000. A government relations professional at a major corporation can earn over $320,000, several sources said on condition of anonymity to discuss their pay. In some sectors, that will also come with a range of perks unavailable to political staff: free private health insurance and gym membership, media subscriptions, travel and an entertainment budget to boot. Already, a few of the Albanese government's former staff have landed in high-profile corporate roles. Todorovic, the former Channel 10 journalist, began as local media director for PsiQuantum, the Silicon Valley quantum computing start-up that Labor has committed hundreds of millions to in loans and investment. After 14 years with Plibersek, Doran, her chief of staff, is headed to the Commonwealth Bank as general manager of government affairs. Liz Fitch, who quit as Albanese's press secretary last year, is now head of government affairs for Australia and New Zealand at Microsoft. Loading The ranks of Australia's major corporate players, from the big four banks, to Qantas, mining companies, and the like, are filled with people who have experience working on both sides of politics. Where former Labor staff see opportunities that match their skills, some integrity experts see a red flag. Chair of the Centre for Public Integrity, Anthony Whealy, describes lobbying and the flow of senior government and bureaucratic figures into the industry as a 'very nasty disease' that 'needs a good vaccination'. 'The government is not doing that well because it's falling into the habits that governments so often do, of complacency and then wanting to shut itself off from proper accountability and transparency. That's a worrying trend and I think it'll only get worse,' the former NSW Court of Appeal judge says. Former staffers dispute the notion of a neatly revolving door between politics and the private sector. 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Despite the horrendous hours and relentless pressure, everyone spoken to for this story described working in politics as an unforgettable honour, an emotional roller-coaster that can be become borderline addictive. 'You have some pretty amazing highs and some pretty horrific lows,' says Liddell, who left politics after Shorten's gutting 2019 election loss. Sherr says that while the opportunity to work for a Labor government was 'the job of a lifetime'. The accompanying lifestyle he can do without.
