Australia

Context at a glance

An Australian family outside their new Habitat house

An estimated 100,000 people are homeless or live in sub-standard conditions in Australia. A further 200,000 families are on waiting lists for publicly-funded housing, with more than 30,000 families living under private rental “housing stress”, many spending up to half of their income on temporary, inadequate accommodation.

Because public housing cannot keep up with demand, families are forced into a “poverty trap”, unable to save enough for a down payment or mortgage payments for their own homes as incomes are eaten away by excessively high rents.

Habitat for Humanity programme

HFH Australia completed its first house in the early 1990s. It has affiliates in five of the six states; Victoria has chapters in Bayside, Mornington Peninsula, Ballarat, Baw Baw, Shepparton, Plenty Valley, Geelong and Whitehorse; New South Wales has chapters in Cowra, Orange, Quirindi, ACT and South East NSW, and Western Sydney; Adelaide in South Australia; Perth in Western Australia; South East Queensland, Gympie and Caboolture in Queensland with two new proposed chapters planned in Bileola and Fraser Coast.

High land costs make it impractical for low-income families in Australia to buy a home. Australian affiliates overcome this obstacle by working to secure land at affordable rates.

HFH Australia builds and renovates homes using the traditional Habitat model where partner families are required to invest 500 hours of their labour – sweat equity – into building their home. It takes approximately six to nine months to complete the houses.

Habitat homes in Australia average approximately 100 sq. m. They are usually timber frame structures fitted with wall cladding and concrete or timber floors.

HFH Australia also supports Habitat activities in the Asia-Pacific region. Its partnerships are supported the building or renovation of more than 1,000 homes in Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Timor Leste in 2007. This figure will increase as current partners continue their funding, and new partners make new sponsorship commitments.

• HFH Australia’s 66th house was completed in early 2007.
• HFH Australia has been selected as the charity partner for dmg world media’s Melbourne, Adelaide and Sydney Home and Design Shows in 2007. The seven shows offer Habitat the possibility of interacting with 420,000 participants and 2,100 industry-related exhibitors.
• HFH Australia has been nominated as the charity of choice for gift product manufacturer Hatcher’s Christmas range. The three-year partnership entails the placing of the Habitat logo and story on 500,000 product units, available in major retail chains in Australia.
• An “Affordable Housing Land Trust” was launched by HFH Australia in 2006 to further its housing projects for low-income families in Australia through the acquisition of land.
• HFH Australia was the winner of the 2005 Prime Minister’s Award for excellence in community business partnerships in the medium business category. The award recognises the partnership between Habitat for Humanity and PMI Mortgage Insurance.
• Around 15 Global Village teams from Australia are expected to travel to countries such as Fiji, Sri Lanka, Timor Leste (East Timor) and India in the next 12 months.
• HFH Australia is partnering with the government to provide affordable housing in a potential nine-house site in New South Wales.

Back to list of countries