Overview

• The national Rental Affordability Snapshot tested about 51,000 listings and found only tiny shares were affordable for key roles, including 0.8% for early childhood staff, 1.1% for cleaners, 1.5% for nurses, 2.3% for ambulance officers and 3.3% for school teachers.
• Listings rose roughly 13% year on year, yet the report detected no meaningful improvement in affordability for any essential worker group.
• In NSW, Anglicare Sydney reviewed 17,028 listings and found just 3% were affordable for a teacher statewide, only 1% in Greater Sydney, and none available for essential workers in the northern beaches and Sutherland; median Sydney rents would consume about 65–88% of the workers’ incomes.
• The snapshot highlights near-total exclusion in several jurisdictions, with no affordable rentals for a solo bartender in the ACT, only five in the Northern Territory, 80 in Victoria, and less than 1% of Queensland rentals affordable for an average hospitality worker.
• Anglicare calls for at least 25,000 new public and community homes each year alongside tax changes and stronger renter safeguards, warning that housing stress is undermining staffing for schools, hospitals and aged care.