12/10/2026
🏠WHEN DID HAVING A ROOF OVER YOUR HEAD BECOME A LUXURY?
Here's a question I'd genuinely like Australians to think about.
If you lost your home tomorrow, could you actually afford to find another one?
Not just afford the rent. Could you find somewhere available? Compete with dozens of other applicants? Pay the bond, rent in advance, moving costs, and still afford to feed your family?
Because the housing crisis is no longer just affecting people on unemployment benefits or low incomes. It's affecting working Australians, families, pensioners, and people who have spent their entire lives doing everything they were told was right.
And the statistics paint a confronting picture.
đź“Š LET'S LOOK AT THE FACTS.
🏠In September 2026, Brisbane's median advertised weekly rent reached $700. That's $36,400 a year, before electricity, groceries, transport or any other living expenses.
🏠Anglicare's 2026 Rental Affordability Snapshot examined 8,163 rental properties across southern Queensland.
Only 26 properties (0.3%) were affordable and appropriate for households receiving income support.
Only 444 properties (5.4%) were affordable and appropriate for households on minimum wage.
For households receiving income support with children, there wasn't a single suitable affordable property in that survey.
🏠As of 31 August 2026, Queensland had 24,454 active households on its social housing register, representing 41,995 people.
🏠During 2024–25, almost 289,000 Australians sought assistance from specialist homelessness services.
Now think about what those numbers actually mean.
Imagine being 65 years old, having worked your entire life, and discovering your pension won't cover the rent.
Imagine being a single mother working five days a week, yet being unable to find a home you can afford.
Imagine having two incomes coming into your household and still living one unexpected expense away from financial disaster.
And imagine being told to just get a job, work harder, or manage your money better.
At Nourish Street Inc, we meet people living in tents, cars and public spaces. Some are employed. Some are elderly. Others are families whose circumstances have changed through no fault of their own.
We also meet people dealing with addiction, mental illness and complex personal circumstances. They deserve housing opportunities too.
But here's something worth considering.
How can we expect people to escape homelessness when even those with jobs are struggling to enter the rental market?
Building more homes is part of the answer. So is making housing affordable, increasing suitable social housing, and preventing people from losing their homes in the first place.
There are genuine questions about how we achieve that, how we fund it, and what different levels of government should be responsible for.
But the human consequences are already happening.
đź’¬ I WANT TO HEAR YOUR THOUGHTS.
1. What percentage of someone's income do you believe is reasonable to spend on rent?
2. Have you or someone you know struggled to find an affordable rental despite being employed?
3. Should secure, affordable housing be treated as a basic necessity, or is it ultimately the individual's responsibility to find a way to afford it?
4. What do you believe would make the biggest difference to Australia's housing crisis?
I'm genuinely interested in hearing different perspectives, including from landlords, renters, homeowners and people experiencing homelessness.
Let's have a respectful conversation, because this issue affects far more Australians than many people realise.
You don't have to be homeless to be affected by the housing crisis. You just have to be one of the millions of Australians trying to keep a roof over your head.
Beau,
❤️ Nourish Street Inc
