2023-2024 Federal Budget - Housing

Increasing the Supply of Social and Affordable Housing and Making it Easier to Buy a Home

The Government will introduce a number of housing measures to increase support for social and affordable housing across the country and improve access for home buyers, including:

• increasing the Government-guaranteed liability cap of the National Housing and Finance Investment Corporation (NHFIC) by $2.0 billion to $7.5 billion to enable NHFIC to increase its support for social and affordable housing through loans from the Affordable Housing Bond Aggregator
• amending NHFIC's Investment Mandate to require NHFIC to take reasonable steps to allocate a minimum of 1,200 homes to be delivered in each state and territory within 5 years of the Housing Australia Future Fund commencing operation
• expand the eligibility of the Home Guarantee Scheme to:
  • allow any 2 eligible people to be joint applicants for a guarantee beyond spouses and de facto partners
  • allow non-first home buyers who have not owned a property in Australia for at least 10 years to access the First Home Guarantee and Regional Home Guarantee
  • allow a single legal guardian of children to access the Family Home Guarantee
  • allow Australian permanent residents to access the Scheme
• redirecting interest earnings on unallocated NHFIC funds to support more social and affordable housing and delivery of housing priorities.

Budget Speech p 6
Budget Paper No 2 p 212
Budget Overview p 19
Women's Budget Statement p 18
Media Release

Increased Support for Commonwealth Rent Assistance Recipients

The Government will provide $2.7 billion over 5 years from 2022-23 (and $0.7 billion per year ongoing) to increase the maximum rates of the Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) allowances by 15 per cent to help address rental affordability challenges for CRA recipients.

Budget Speech p 6
Budget Paper No 2 p 200
Budget Overview p 18
Women's Budget Statement p 17
Regional Ministerial Budget Statement p 82
Cost-of-Living Relief Fact Sheet
Media Release

Closing the Gap - further investment

The Government will provide $492.7 million over 5 years from 2022-23 for a range of measures to support critical investment in infrastructure, employment, justice, education, and housing initiatives for First Nations peoples, including:

• $111.7 million in 2023-24 for a new one-year partnership with the Northern Territory Government to accelerate the building of new remote housing to reduce overcrowding
• $20.8 million over two years from 2023-24 to Aboriginal Hostels Limited to improve the service offering and undertake urgent repairs and capital works.

Budget Speech p 11
Budget Paper No 2 p 190
Budget Overview p 53
Regional Ministerial Budget Statement p 75
Empowering Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People Fact Sheet
Media Release

National Housing and Homelessness Agreement Transitional Funding

The Government will provide additional funding of $67.5 million in 2023-24 to boost homelessness funding to states and territories. The funding will be used to support the provision of homelessness services through the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement in 2023-24. The current National Housing and Homelessness Agreement provides over $1.6 billion to states and territories, with the Government committing to a one-year extension for the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement to 30 June 2024 in the 2022-23 October Budget, while negotiations are underway with states and territories.

Budget Paper No 2 p 201
Women's Budget Statement p 56
Regional Ministerial Budget Statement p 85
Cost-of-Living Relief Fact Sheet
Media Release

Housing (Build-To-Rent Developments) - accelerating tax deductions and reducing managed investment trust withholding tax rate

For eligible new build-to-rent projects where construction commences after 7:30 PM (AEST) on 9 May 2023 (Budget night), the Government will:

• increase the rate for the capital works tax deduction (depreciation) to 4 per cent per year
• reduce the final withholding tax rate on eligible fund payments from managed investment trust (MIT) investments from 30 per cent to 15 per cent.

This measure will encourage investment and construction in the build-to-rent sector, expanding Australia's housing supply. This measure will apply to build-to-rent projects consisting of 50 or more apartments or dwellings made available for rent to the general public. The dwellings must be retained under single ownership for at least 10 years before being able to be sold and landlords must offer a lease term of at least 3 years for each dwelling.

The reduced managed investment trust withholding tax rate for residential build-to-rent will apply from 1 July 2024. Consultation will be undertaken on implementation details, including any minimum proportion of dwellings being offered as affordable tenancies and the length of time dwellings must be retained under single ownership.
This measure is estimated to decrease receipts by $30.0 million and increase payments by $4.3 million over the 5 years from 2022-23.

Budget Speech p 6
Budget Paper No 2 p 19
Budget Overview p 19
Cost-of-Living Relief Fact Sheet
Media Release