The challenge
Housing is becoming more and more unaffordable for large groups of renters. How can we provide more social and affordable housing of high quality that will have positive impacts on tenants’ outcomes?
The research
The Future Directions (FD) Strategy was introduced in 2016 and outlined the NSW state government’s vision for social and affordable housing from 2016 to 2025. Three major programs were introduced: Social and Affordable Housing Fund, Land and Housing Corporation Future Directions Implementation Projects, and Social Housing Management Transfer. The first two programs aimed to deliver new / renewed social housing sometimes targeting specific groups (such as older people, or women and children escaping domestic violence), while the latter program involves a transfer of all existing (often older) public housing in specific areas to community housing providers.
A consortium of five research organisations to evaluate this Strategy was led by the Melbourne Institute. Implementation and impacts on outcomes of tenants within the period from the start of 2016 to 30 June 2021 are evaluated separately for each of the programs and for the Strategy overall, and a cost-benefit analysis is provided for each program as well. We had at most three years of linked administrative data on tenants’ outcomes after entering a FD tenancy available, and for most tenants it is only one or two years. This is a short period to achieve improvements in measurable outcomes especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021.
The impact
Early results show that new or renewed high-quality social housing:
- provided tenancy stability and lowers the probability of housing insecurity and homelessness.
- improved employment outcomes of tenants under 55 and Aboriginal tenants.
- Led to fewer contacts with the justice system and fewer instances of domestic violence reporting for male tenants, tenants under 55, tenants in major cities, and Aboriginal and culturally and linguistically diverse tenants.
- And seems to increase tenants’ satisfaction across a range of domains (health, safety, community inclusion, life achievements, personal relationships and standard of living).
The methodologies and data linkages can be replicated, and thus provide a framework for future evaluations to assess whether these effects remain/strengthen in the longer term.
Our researchers
Melbourne Institute - Ferdi Botha, Barbara Broadway, Lisa Cameron, Nicolas Hérault, Guyonne Kalb, Julie Moschion, Miguel Ruiz, Diana Contreras Suarez, Yi-Ping Tseng.
Many other researchers were involved including those from Centre for Evidence and Implementation, Cultural and Indigenous Research Centre Australia, RMIT and Monash University.
Our partner
New South Wales Department of Communities and Justice