Community Housing Industry Association report finds Ballarat's housing stress ranks highest in regional Victoria

The study, conducted by Community Housing Industry Association in partnership with the University of New South Wales and the University of Sydney, found Ballarat ranked among the highest for those experiencing 'unmet housing need' in regional Victoria.

Unmet housing need in this instance refers to someone either experiencing homelessness, living in an overcrowded house or spending more than 30 per cent of their income on rent.

Uniting Ballarat homelessness senior manager Adam Liversage said these figures were "unsurprising" taking into consideration their organisation had recorded their "highest numbers ever" for those in need of affordable accomodation.

"Currently we have 225 households currently experiencing homelessness on our priority list waiting for some form of affordable accommodation and the break up of that for over 25s is we have 152 households and 79 of those 152 households are families," Mr Liversage said.

However, he said what was most concerning was the number of young people grappling with homelessness.

"We currently have 73 households who are experiencing homelessness and out of that 73 we have 33 young families currently experiencing homelessness which means we have 40 young people who are also homeless," Mr Liversage said.

The CHIA report found among the 4600 households facing unmet housing needs in the region, 1886 were families while 1840 were single people.

Buxton Real Estate director Mark Nunn said the property market was dealing with a shortage in rentals which he believed were largely due to the introduction of new laws for Victorian landlords in 2021.

"So what's happened is interest rates have gone up rapidly last year and are continuing to do so but also the minimum standards and checks for landlords and for homeowners for renting properties out, has increased," Mr Nunn said.

"So the minimum standards landlords have had to do, they're more intensive than they were in the past. So what that has done is, a lot of people that own investment properties have now chosen to sell them.

"So they're no longer an investment property, which is kind of dried up the supply of rental houses available."

He said more people wanting a tree change from capital cities was also driving the decline in available properties.

Mr Liversage said this population surge was adding to the challenges their organisation was battling with in terms of finding affordable private rentals for their clients.

"A lot of program workers have developed strong relationships with a lot of real estate agents but it is becoming increasingly difficult to ascertain rentals for our consumers who are presenting because of the increase in rent and cost of living and inflation," he said.

"We're only six months into the financial year and we've had 1177 people present as homeless through our entry point which is really concerning.

"Last year alone we worked with 149 rough sleepers in Ballarat and that was just last year."

Mr Liversage said more resources and more funding to community groups such as theirs were sorely needed to aid in alleviating the region's housing stress.

"We have our Private Rental Assistance Program that assists people into rentals but more importantly that program assisted about 250 households last year alone to sustain their tenancies. So that's people falling into arrears," he said.

"So it's really important for programs like PRAP to be given extra resources and dollars to assist people to co pay rent or afford rent and to continue to sustain their tenancy."

Mr Nunn said there needed to be more people purchasing investment properties to help expand the rental market.

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"We need people that own their own home that want to invest in real estate to buy more property and get an investment property or two and have that available for renters because that's what we're lacking at the moment," he said.

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