Housing & Homelessness 

Review of additional housing needs for low income renters 

December 2000 

Housing assistance is delivered to low income renters either through Rent Assistance (RA), which provides assistance towards rental costs for households on income support renting privately or through the Commonwealth State Housing Agreement (CSHA) which, among other things, funds public housing. With the growth of RA, social housing assistance is increasingly being targeted at households that are unable to secure and/or maintain tenancies in the private rental market. This group are considered to have additional housing needs, that is needs additional to affordability related needs.

There is however no common understanding of the situations that give rise to additional housing needs, what they are or the number of households experiencing additional housing needs.

The purpose of the project therefore was to:
  • define the range of circumstances that give rise to the need for a housing supply response and that, for the purpose of this project, are called additional housing needs;
  • explore the nature of additional housing needs;
  • examine the range of approaches in the assessment and prioritisation of people's needs for the allocation of public and community housing; and
  • assess the extent of additional housing needs among private renters.

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