Nurses, Teachers and Emergency Service Workers can’t afford to live in Sydney
The most affordable town closest to Sydney for an entry-level nurse to live in is Cessnock in the NSW Hunter region, a new report revealing the extent of Sydney’s housing affordability crisis has found.
The University of Sydney report, released on Monday, found in the 10 years between 2006 and 2016, Sydney lost close to 20 per cent of key workers including teachers, nurses and emergency service workers to outer and regional areas in the Illawarra, Southern Highlands and Hunter Valley.
Key workers can’t afford to buy a home in Sydney’s inner-city suburbs while a nurse with five years experience who earns about $57,000 can only afford to buy a home in Cessnock, about 100km from Sydney, the Key Worker Housing Affordability report found.
“Australia’s key workers are increasingly locked out of home ownership, particularly in the metropolitan housing markets of Sydney and Melbourne,” the report said.
“High house prices and rents are ‘pushing out’ some of Sydney’s key workers.”
Port Stephens, Lake Macquarie, Maitland and Cessnock are the only four suburbs in the NSW Hunter and Central Coast that Sydney’s 156,000 key workers can afford – all more than 100km away from Sydney.
The report found Parramatta in Sydney’s west experienced the largest loss of key workers from 2006 to 2016 while the Shoalhaven, Southern Highlands, the Hunter Valley and Illawarra all had an increase in key workers moving to the area.
The report revealed 12 per cent of police officers employed in Sydney’s CBD and inner south live in the Central Coast, Illawarra, Newcastle and Hunter – and they commute between 50-100km to get to work.
“For the many key workers who work in shifts, such as nurses, police and paramedics, often the car is the only means available to travel to work because of the poor availability of public transport in non-peak times,” the report said.
The report also found a single key worker eyeing a $1 million property in Sydney in 2016 would need 13 years to save a deposit, compared with 8.4 years in 2006.
Teachers Mutual Bank, which commissioned the report, said any cooling off in Sydney’s housing market has not trickled down to a price range that key workers can afford.
“It would have to be the Ice Age for any such cooling to fit their salary and household budget,” chief executive officer Steve James said in a statement.
“For teachers who are earning under six-figure incomes, a 10 per cent deposit on a $1.5 million house is not feasible.
“They still can’t afford to live within 100km of where they work.”
Several urgent solutions were suggested to ensure Sydney didn’t lose more of its key workers including a key worker housing target for the NSW government and policies to reduce construction costs for key worker accommodation in Sydney.
Source:News.com.au
