Hal Pawson

UNSW Sydney | UNSW · Faculty of Built Environment

Two years after the outbreak of COVID-19, this report analyses pandemic impacts on housing systems across a range of high income countries during this period, and documents a range of policy responses relating to housing and homelessness. Our review arises from parallel studies initiated in mid-2020 by the UK Collaborative Centre for Housing Eviden...

In early 2020, while China’s centralised governance response rapidly brought COVID-19 under control, tenure inequality and private rental sector precarity continued unabated. Drawing on stakeholder interviews in Shanghai, nation-wide renter complaints analysis, and a review of government pandemic reactions, this paper reveals the stark contrast bet...

Especially in modern high-income countries, housing provision involves complex and interconnected systems in which numerous factors affect both demand and supply. Certain inherent features of housing as a product, as well as the increasingly fragmented and intellectually eroded state of housing policy governance, also contribute to making this a pa...

This study was commissioned by QCOSS. It follows on from our 2023 QCOSS-sponsored report that presented a ‘blueprint’ on possible reforms to address Queensland's housing and homelessness policy challenges. Proposals were structured under four headings: 1. Enhancement of housing policymaking and housing policy governance 2. Funding necessary additi...

Australia, like most developed countries, has promoted homeownership as an express housing policy goal for many decades. Domestically and internationally, recent years have seen growing efforts to enhance access to owner‐occupation for prospective first home buyers (FHBs). FHB assistance takes many forms. Presenting a new typology of such measures,...

The housing experience of international students has attracted increasing academic attention in recent years. Australia’s large international student population is largely reliant on lightly-regulated private rental housing, a market sector subject to extreme turbulence during COVID-19. However, while aspects of Australian student housing stress du...

The homelessness monitor is a longitudinal study providing an independent analysis of the homelessness impacts of recent economic and policy developments across the UK. Separate reports are produced for England, Scotland and Wales, with the most recent Great Britain synthesis report published in 2022. This year's Scotland Monitor is an account of h...

Assessing the housing policy record of Australia's Albanese Govt, two years into its term of office

This final Inquiry examines the challenges of financing to buy a first home. It incorporates four supporting Research Projects and focuses on socio-economic developments and policy settings that impact access to home ownership. While high house prices are often cited as the biggest challenge faced by first homebuyers, this Inquiry highlights that t...

This research investigates the rationale for an Australian Housing and Homelessness Strategy. Applying contemporary thinking about the role of governments in complex problem-solving, and lessons from other ‘national approaches’ here and internationally, it sets out options for achieving cohesive, co-ordinated action on housing and homelessness in t...

The research was directed to the following questions: 1 What is the rationale for a national approach to housing and homelessness in Australia? (a) What is it about contemporary housing and homelessness problems that calls for a national approach? (b) How does contemporary thinking about the role governments in solving problems support a national a...

Against the backdrop of the state’s deteriorating housing situation, this study was commissioned by QCOSS to develop policy options for tackling Queensland’s identified housing policy challenges; in particular, as these relate to low-income households with limited capability to compete for adequate accommodation in the private market.

This article unpacks the connection between a growing cohort of small‐scale but purposive property investors and urban socio‐spatial restructuring. We analyse private rental housing as a tenure share to demonstrate its spatial correlation with the suburbanisation of socio‐economic disadvantage in Sydney, Australia, between 1991 and 2016. Then, we s...

Australian Homelessness Monitor (AHM) 2022 presents an independent analysis of this important social problem. Its overarching purpose is to better inform housing and homelessness policymaking. To this end the report investigates the changing scale and nature of the problem and assesses recent policy and practice developments seen in response.

Proponents of demand-side rental subsidy programmes have argued that they enhance consumer choice while costing less than supply-side interventions. However, unanswered questions remain on the effectiveness of demand-side rental subsidies in reducing affordability stress among low-income renters. This paper analyses Australia’s Commonwealth Rent As...

This research reviewed first homebuyer (FHB) assistance programs in Australia and seven comparator countries: Canada, Finland, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Singapore and the UK. It considered to what degree such assistance are effective in expanding access to home ownership to those whose entry would be otherwise delayed or impossible, or in...

https://cityfutures.ada.unsw.edu.au/research/projects/longitudinal-evaluation-of-riverwood-north-renewal-project/ Riverwood North is a large public housing estate in Sydney’s inner southwest. The NSW State Government has awarded PAYCE Communities the tender to regenerate the estate. Initiated in 2011 and also involving St George Community Housing...

As shown in this report, the past 30 years has seen Australia’s social housing sector capacity effectively cut by more than half. This at a time when the incidence of rental housing stress and homelessness has substantially increased. Largely drawing on existing published statistics and policy documents, this research investigates the resulting eff...

Against a global backdrop of growing concerns on housing crises, Chinese megacities have earned unwelcome distinction as among the world’s least affordable real estate. In the West, the alleged ‘over-restrictiveness’ of land-use planning has formed a focus of contestation on factors contributing to unduly expensive housing. In the Chinese context,...

This research reviewed Australia’s COVID-19 housing policy responses to better understand their intervention approach, underlying logic, short and long term goals, target groups and level of success.

This is the second report of a research project that began in mid-2020, after the early dramatic responses by governments and individuals to the COVID-19 pandemic. The study has been undertaken as part of the UNSW-ACOSS Poverty and Inequality Partnership work program, and also supported by Mission Australia, National Shelter and Queensland Shelter....

The homelessness monitor is a longitudinal study providing an independent analysis of the homelessness impacts of recent economic and policy developments across the UK. Separate reports are produced for England, Scotland and Wales. This year’s Wales Monitor is an account of how homelessness stands in Wales in 2021, or as close to 2021 as data avai...

This report stems from an ongoing research program to investigate and expose the connectivity between housing system outcomes and economic performance. In gauging the views of leading Australian economists and residential property market experts it reveals a strong consensus that governments must pay greater attention to the way that over-expensive...

An uncommon ‘homeowner’ protest in Shanghai in 2017 manifested public anger towards a government crackdown on commercial property converted apartments (CPCAs). Spotlighting this previously hidden but significant Chinese housing submarket, the episode highlighted ‘homeowner’ concerns over insecure property rights. Internationally, commercial-to-resi...

This report draws on a major review of Australian and international literature about relationships between housing systems and economic performance. It is also informed by the authors' empirical research on the perspectives of Australia's leading economists and housing market experts on housing-economy linkages. The report argues that housing syste...

This article identifies and examines a range of policy reform opportunities in Australia arising from COVID‐19. The authors demonstrate how COVID‐19 presents unique opportunities for rethinking and redesigning long‐standing rules and regulations covering how people live and work in Australia, with some opportunities arising coincidentally and other...

This chapter examines housing affordability in the PRS. We first discuss the concept of rental stress and its prevalence in Australia. The literature on housing affordability and wellbeing is then briefly reviewed. Drawing on our 2015 renters’ survey in Sydney and Melbourne, the financial hardship faced by tenants in different housing markets is as...

This chapter focuses on the body of regulation which sets the norms and expected behaviours involved in Australia’s landlord-tenant relations. It opens by exploring the rationale for private rental regulation, especially in terms of the prevailing neo-liberal governance philosophy. Next, we present a national overview of tenancy regulation across A...

This chapter examines the process of finding rented accommodation, whether tenants feel at home in their accommodation and what contributes or detracts from a sense of home. The capacity to secure a suitable rental property varies dramatically and is shaped fundamentally by a tenants’ financial resources. The massive shortage of affordable rentals...

Research on Australia’s private rental sector (PRS) has tended to focus on the demand side of the market. However, to properly comprehend how the sector functions an understanding of the landlord cohort, their motivations and behaviour, is also essential. This chapter therefore concentrates on the individuals and entities who provide private rental...

The chapter, drawing on Clapham’s concept of housing pathways, examines why people find themselves reliant on the PRS, often for extended periods or even lifelong. Four groups are focused on—long-term renters (ten years or more) who are reliant on the PRS for their accommodation because they have no other option. They are primarily low-income house...

Light regulation of the PRS means that private renters on short fixed term leases or periodic tenancies can be required to leave their home at short notice, typically when the property is being sold or if the landlord or their family wants to live in the property. In most Australian states they can also be given notice to leave without any stated g...

The chapter charts three main periods in the history of private renting since the end of WW1. In the first period (1919–1945), private renting was widespread in the working-class inner suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne but became deeply unpopular due to evictions and poor quality, badly maintained properties. In the second period (1946-mid-1980s), po...

This chapter summarises our main arguments and findings and reflects on the possible impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on the private rental sector. We argue that the high cost of housing relative to incomes and the near stagnation in the building of social housing, has meant that for an increasing proportion of Australians private renting is their...

This ninth annual report provides an account of how homelessness stands in England in 2020 (or as close to 2020 as data availability will allow), and analyses key trends in the period running up to 2020. This year's report focuses in particular on what has changed over the past year, with a particular focus on impacts resulting from the COVID-19 pa...

This report analyses opinions of Australia’s top economists and other senior policy experts on how housing fits into economic and policy narratives in this country. It draws on results of an online survey of that involved 87 participants (47 economists and 40 non-economists). Survey respondents indicated their level of agreement or disagreement wit...

This study delivers a comparative examination of responses to homelessness during the COVID-19 crisis across England, Scotland and Wales, placing these Great Britain (GB) responses in an international context

This report looks at the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on housing and homelessness in Australia during 2020. After analysing pandemic impacts on rental housing markets, it explores what housing and homelessness policy changes occurred; how these changes were formulated; and how they were implemented, using both publicly available data and focuse...

This fascinating book draws on a decade of research by three leading housing researchers to expose the dire circumstances of many among the growing number of Australian private renters. Placed in the context of past trends and policy failings, it provides a compelling account of the realities of private rental living, drawing on interviews with ten...

This research examines possible cost-effective reforms of Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) (demand-side housing assistance) that could improve housing outcomes for low-income renters.

This report’s overarching aim is to shed light on possible cost-effective reforms of demand-side housing assistance that could improve housing outcomes for low-income renters. The main demand-side rental housing assistance for low-income renters in Australia is Commonwealth Rent Assistance - or CRA, which is payable to eligible households renting o...

The latest Australian Homelessness Monitor shows the national homelessness rate is set to surge as short-term coronavirus and housing protections phase down. The 2020 Australian Homelessness Monitor offers an independent analysis of homelessness in Australia. It investigates the changing scale and nature of the problem, and assesses recent policy a...

The rhetoric and practice of localism has attracted significant support within both political and academic circles in the UK in recent years. However, it is the contention of this article that there are, or should be, limits to localism as applied to the basic citizenship rights of vulnerable people. Drawing on a ten-year, mixed-methods study, we u...

• Demand for social housing in Australia significantly exceeds supply. • The policy response to the demand has focused on 'pathways', with pathways being shaped by increased targeting to people with the highest needs. • As a result, there are inconsistencies between operational policies and the reality of people's lives as they traverse housing pat...

The article examines that very small group of long-term private renters - people who decide to rent for an extended period.

For more than two decades, Australia’s private rental sector (PRS) has seen rapid growth, as latterly replicated in most other anglophone nations. Commentary and scholarly attention have generally focused on the population occupying this growing sector – so-called ‘generation rent’. The corollary, ‘generation landlord’, has meanwhile remained large...

This collection provides a comprehensive grounding in contemporary policy settings across all sectors of the Australian public policy housing system and investigates the many dimensions of housing affordability and government actions that affect this concern. The book analyzes the causes and implications of declining home ownership, rising rates of...

Around one in every four Australians rent their home from a private landlord. The past two decades have seen strong growth in the private rental sector and a rising incidence of long-term (perhaps perpetual) renting, especially among younger and less affluent Australians. This chapter first describes the structure and institutions of Australia’s re...

This chapter examines government-led responses to the intensifying shortage of affordable housing. The emphasis is on endeavours to enable low cost (below-market) rental housing development using public subsidies and other incentives to leverage private investment, alongside adoption of new institutional and governance arrangements for affordable h...

Land use planning policies are a critical component of the institutional architecture that frames housing policy. Indeed a core goal of land use planning is to ensure an ‘adequate supply’ of housing. This chapter has three main components. Drawing on planning and land economics principles, it first examines the ways that land use planning measures,...

Drawing on the evidence marshalled throughout the book, this chapter makes the case for fundamental reform of Australia’s housing policy regime and the associated governance of housing to address problems which are now deeply embedded in Australia’s housing system—especially unaffordable housing and growing wealth inequality. High level aims of ref...

This chapter examines the motivations and justifications that underlie housing policy measures or ‘interventions’. The first part of the chapter discusses the classic stated reasons for government action in this sphere: measures to promote efficiency (countering ‘market failure’), to enhance equity (addressing social justice concerns) and to ensure...

Concerns surrounding affordability have become central to Australian housing debates. This chapter begins by describing the housing affordability issues that have been the focal point of what is popularly seen as Australia’s housing crisis, i.e. the growing hurdles faced by many would-be first home buyers, a trend generally attributed to house pric...

Indigenous peoples remain among the most disadvantaged Australians in terms of their housing needs. This chapter begins by discussing the historical and cultural factors and past policy approaches that helped to shape the specific housing needs of Indigenous Australians in both urban and remote geographic settings. The chapter continues by critical...

Home ownership has been seen as a core aspiration and value for most, if not all, Australians from European settlement to the present. This chapter begins by examining Australia’s home ownership rate in a comparative context. Trends in this rate, changes in government support for home ownership and the reasons for emerging concerns about falling ra...

In Australia, as in many other developed countries, provision of public housing (a form of social housing) formed a core component of housing policy for lower-income earners for much of the twentieth century post-1945. Despite its proportionately small and shrinking size in Australia (less than 5% of all dwellings), the sector’s vital social role m...

The article discusses the situation of private renters in different locations in Sydney and Melbourne.

Build-to-rent (BtR) is a form of residential development involving apartment blocks or complexes purpose-built for rental occupation and held in single ownership as long-term revenue-generating assets. As such, BtR represents a significant departure from a traditional Australian residential development and ownership model where multi-unit blocks ar...

The homelessness monitor England 2019 is the eighth instalment of an annual state-of-the-nation report looking at the impact of economic and policy developments on homelessness. Drawing on statistical analysis, insights from a large scale survey with local authorities and in-depth interviews with key informants, this year’s monitor reveals the cha...

Analysis of recent trends in homelessness and the supply of social housing in each of the four UK jurisdictions.

This international knowledge exchange project explored the conventional housing policy narratives that have dominated government thinking in Australia, Britain and Canada (the ABC countries) over the past 20-30 years. It sought to construct more effective, progressive policy narratives robust enough to thrive within the tough competitive environmen...

This chapter briefly discusses ‘business diversification’ developments among NFP housing provider organisations in Australia, Canada and the UK. Drawing on contacts with NFP housing executives participating in the Shaping Futures collaboration, it then explores practitioner perspectives on broadening business activity away from an exclusive focus o...

This chapter explores and analyses the media and popular narratives on Australia's housing that have reflected - and influenced - housing policy directions pursued by national and state governments over recent decades.

Comparative analysis of private rental housing in Australia, Canada and the UK, together with current policy challenges and recent developments

The Homelessness Monitor series is a longitudinal study providing an independent analysis of the homelessness impacts of recent economic and policy developments in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK. This update report provides an account of how homelessness stands in Scotland in 2018, or as close to 2018 as data availability allows, and how things h...

This research informs the development of an investment pathway from the perspective of needs-based social infrastructure. Demographic modelling quantifies the current need for social housing across Australia over the next 20 years. Multi-criteria evaluation and financial modelling compares five investment scenarios involving a range of debt, effici...

This research modelled five alternative pathways to funding social housing and found the ‘capital grant’ model, supplemented by efficient financing, provides the most cost-effective model for Australia. The research also established the current and future unmet need for social housing in different parts of Australia.

Social housing as infrastructure informs the development of a more effective investment pathway that follows from the re-conceptualisation of social housing as needs-based infrastructure. It investigates emerging funding and financing pathways of social housing infrastructure investment internationally and uses demographic projections and financial...