{"id":952652,"date":"2026-11-04T19:56:16","date_gmt":"2026-11-04T19:56:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/952652\/"},"modified":"2026-11-04T19:56:16","modified_gmt":"2026-11-04T19:56:16","slug":"essential-workers-struggle-to-afford-vast-majority-of-rental-listings-report-reveals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/952652\/","title":{"rendered":"Essential workers struggle to afford vast majority of rental listings, report reveals"},"content":{"rendered":"

Essential workers are being priced out of Australia’s private rental market as affordability plummets, new research shows.<\/p>\n

Anglicare’s annual Rental Affordability Snapshot has revealed key occupations, including retail workers, social workers and cleaners, can afford fewer than 1 per cent of rental listings.<\/p>\n

Other essential jobs, such as nursing and teaching, are not faring much better, with just 1.1 and 3.3 per cent of listings deemed affordable, respectively.<\/p>\n

Social worker Allie Thompson is about to move into a new rental in inner north Brisbane for $740 per week, which will take up about half of her income.<\/p>\n

The single mother has chosen to stop taking some of her medications to be able to afford the shift.<\/p>\n

“I just avoid going to the doctor’s as much as I can unless it’s absolutely urgent, and I haven’t been to the dentist in probably 10 years,” she said.<\/p>\n

“My son is the priority, so he gets the dentist, he gets the medical appointments and the mental health appointments.<\/p>\n

“I’ll choose that any day, but that means I’ve had to cut back on those other things that are still important.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Nurse Silvia Laing says she has cut back on luxuries to afford rent.\u00a0 (Supplied.)<\/p>\n

Silvia Laing has worked as a nurse for more than 40 years, and now supports cancer patients living at home.<\/p>\n

The 64-year-old pays $550 a week for rent in Albany, WA, which she splits with her partner.<\/p>\n

Ms Laing said that constitutes about a third of her income.<\/p>\n

“Holidays are one thing that I’ve had pretty much cut, and going out for meals has reduced considerably,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Accommodation and health are on the top priority list, and everything that’s somewhat luxury is just not going to be afforded.”<\/p>\n

Anglicare’s own staff are not immune to the impact of rental prices in the north west of WA.<\/p>\n

Meenaaz Adams is the organisation’s new Pilbara Service Manager and has only just found a rental, eight weeks after moving to the town of Karratha.<\/p>\n

Ms Adams was provided with a month of accommodation but did not realise how difficult securing a long-term home would be.<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Meenaaz Adams works for Anglicare and has also found difficulty securing a rental.\u00a0 (ABC News: Amy Rossbach)<\/p>\n

“We thought that ‘oh we’ll secure something in four weeks’,” she said.<\/p>\n

“No, we were declined three times, something I’ve never experienced.”<\/p>\n

Increased demand from resource companies had put pressure on the local market, with the average weekly rent sitting at around $1,700.<\/p>\n

Wages not keeping up with rent<\/p>\n

The Anglicare report surveyed 48,776 rental listings across Australia, measuring each property against the full-time minimum wage for workers in 16 essential occupations.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

There are no affordable rental properties for a hospitality worker in the Northern Territory, the report shows. (ABC News: Monish Nand)<\/p>\n

Of the jobs included in the research, only three saw an increase in affordability compared to 2025, while the other 13 either decreased or remained stagnant.<\/p>\n

For a hospitality worker in the Northern Territory, there are no affordable rentals available in the state.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, only 338 listings remained.<\/p>\n

Anglicare Australia executive director Kasy Chambers said wage growth had not kept up with rent increases in recent years.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Kasy Chambers says wages have not increased at the same rate as rents. (ABC News: Ian Cutmore)<\/p>\n

“We would have had a social contract or an understanding some years ago that if you worked full-time, if you trained for these kinds of jobs, you would be able to find affordable housing,” she said.<\/p>\n

“You would be able to live a decent, if not opulent, lifestyle. That’s no longer the case.”<\/p>\n

Data from real estate analyst Cotality showed unit rents have increased by 44.3 per cent in the last five years, while house rents have gone up by 36.6 per cent.<\/p>\n

Ms Chambers said wages have increased by less than half that rate in the same period.<\/p>\n

“For those who are paying in the private rental market, sadly, most of that increase has just been swallowed up by rents.”<\/p>\n

Calls for more social housing<\/p>\n

Ms Chambers said the growing disparity between wages and rental affordability was due to an over-reliance on the private market to deliver housing.<\/p>\n

“Over the last 40 years in Australia, consecutive governments have stopped building and funding housing,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Anglicare says more social housing is needed to improve affordability. (ABC News: Mitch Edgar)<\/p>\n

“We don’t necessarily need to build more houses, but what we need to do is build more social housing or shift some pre-existing housing into social housing.<\/p>\n

“That’s what we need in order to enable these people on these wages to rent affordably.”<\/p>\n

The federal housing minister was contacted for comment.<\/p>\n

Ms Thompson said it was sometimes difficult to justify staying in her profession when money is tight.<\/p>\n

“There have been times where I’ve felt like I’m giving to the community and I’m trying to support our community and the government doesn’t care.<\/p>\n

“I want to show up and do this job, but why am I in this job if it’s not paying as well as it needs to be paying for me to actually have access to those other things I require as well?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Essential workers are being priced out of Australia’s private rental market as affordability plummets, new research shows. Anglicare’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":952653,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[180422,64,63,99,2610,132726,7688,248741,28211,11142,248750,392089,4848],"class_list":["post-952652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-anglicare","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-cost-of-living","tag-essential-workers","tag-housing","tag-kasy-chambers","tag-nurses","tag-rent","tag-rental-affordability-snapshot","tag-social-workers","tag-wages"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=952652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/952653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=952652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=952652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=952652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}