Australia Needs Repeatable Housing Not More Complex Apartments
Remember the terrace housing image I shared in an earlier post?
I still think it asks an important question.
Governments keep telling us they are “throwing everything at housing supply.” But if that’s true, why aren’t we asking whether we’re building the right homes?
Homes people want to live in and buy and get the balance right between affordability, size, privacy…strata living isn’t for everyone after all!
Australia doesn’t just have a housing shortage. We have a shortage of straightforward, repeatable housing that can be delivered quickly, efficiently and at scale.
Instead, we continue to favour increasingly complex apartment developments. They take years to approve, years to construct, require countless consultants and trades, and often become the subject of expensive defect disputes. Many leak and face onerous owners corporation disputes.
Not every site needs to be a high-rise!
Not every project needs a bespoke design.
Terraces, townhouses and other medium-density housing can provide a huge solution. They can be repeated across suburbs, built by more builders, completed faster and delivered at a lower cost than many complex apartment projects.
The automotive industry doesn’t redesign every car from scratch.
Manufacturing succeeds through standardisation, repetition and continuous improvement.
Why should housing be any different?
If governments are serious about increasing supply, perhaps the focus should shift from simply announcing more dwellings to encouraging more repeatable housing designs that can be approved faster, built faster and replicated across Victoria and Australia.
Do the research! More complexity isn’t the answer.
Sometimes the quickest way to build more homes is to build simpler homes.
Is the real housing crisis a shortage of land or a shortage of repeatable housing that ordinary builders can deliver at scale, are cost effective and people want to live in!
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