It is a tumultuous time for renters in Australia. The period since the COVID-19 lockdowns has seen extraordinary movements in the PRS, with rapidly rising
rents and low vacancies across the country. The experience of PRS households has also risen in prominence as a topic for public discussion, and as a priority for policymakers.
This report aims to inform the ongoing discussion of rental housing policy with new evidence about the experience of renting in the Australian PRS. A collaboration of National Shelter, NARO, and the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)/UNSW Sydney led Poverty and Inequality Partnership, the report (i) analyses the PRS market context and (ii) presents findings from a national survey of PRS renters.
Each part of the report is the successor to previous research by the collaboration partners.
The PRS market analysis updates the ACOSS-UNSW Sydney PIP reports on the rental housing impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic (Pawson et al. 2021; Pawson et al 2022).
The survey is the successor to two previous surveys conducted by National Shelter, NARO1 and CHOICE, the consumer advocacy organisation: ‘Unsettled: life in Australia’s private rental’ (2017) and ‘Disrupted: the consumer experience of renting in Australia’ (2018).
In the present report, special attention is paid to the experience of survey participants from a range of groups who experience socio-economic disadvantage or who may be vulnerable to problems in the private rental sector (i.e. ‘rental vulnerability’: Troy and Martin 2017).
