Unlike buying a boudoir at the furniture store, housing is a basic need rather than an item of choice. Lodging, like food is something that everyone must either afford or have afforded to them because at the end of the day we all must sleep somewhere safe at night in any civilised society. 

So, to say we care in any first world community about housing and it’s affordability, is the understatement of the millennium. Citizens of all persuasions and all walks of life are concerned about this issue. The bourgeoisie worries about its children affording a home, social providers worry about the homelessness issue and governments of all political colours have publicly declared it a priority.

But given where Sydney sits today as one of the top five most expensive cities in the world, are we really making headway on this important social and economic issue?

I am usually an optimist but in this instance, I am not. A former treasurer of NSW, Michael Costa told me ten years ago that this was a problem without an obvious solution for Sydney and to a lesser degree, Melbourne. When I asked what could be done, he remarked with whimsical concern that “Sydney has become London - too expensive for even its own denizens”.

Given that this has now become a truthful prophecy, should there be cause for concern that Joe Blogs or as they say in London, the Man on the Clapham Omnibus, can only afford to live outside of Sydney if his budget is $600,000 or less?

Of course it is - the NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has made housing affordability her priority, with stamp duty concessions for purchasers under $600,000. The government is also fast tracking the rezoning of land in many parts of Sydney to increase supply but being kind and well-meaning is one thing, being effective is another.

In my view, as someone who has worked in the property sector for over 30 years, rezoning new land on its own as a simple binary measure will not even make a dent in tackling this rather vexatious issue. This is because another approval, a DA, is still required before anything can be built on any block of land in the state of NSW. 

This means it takes around five to six years to construct and deliver a dwelling to a customer from when it is conceived. Let me elucidate; six months to purchase and settle, two years to obtain a DA, one year for a Construction Certificate and two years to build – bingo five to six years. It should also be noted that this is for already-zoned land. If the land we are talking about requires zoning, that would add an additional three to five years to the already burdensome delivery equation.

To explain briefly, we enjoy a system that is an agglomerated metamorphosis between the Euclidean US segregation’s zoning model of 1926 and the highly structured British Planning system. Our Environmental Planning and Assessment Act of 1979 is a progeny - a child of the Town and Country Planning Act of England of 1932 and that amalgam makes for a highly cumbersome delivery mechanism. And within this mechanism neither zoning change nor development approval can be granted too speedily by anyone, even the Minister himself.

That does mean, however, for those 70 percent of home owners who can already lay title to their own dwellings that great tax-free wealth can be created for a considerable segment of the community. This is with the comforting smile of the Big Four Banks, who all still hold substantial interest in the Australian housing sector with record levels of lending to home owners, who are feeling ever-increasing financial and repayment stress.

However, I don’t believe that it is all doom and gloom. We are still very fortunate to have amongst the highest home owner ratio percentages in the world. Currently at 12 times the average annual earnings or the average home, the same 70 percent would certainly be enjoying a benefit over the other 30 percent. So does this mean that the great Australian dream of owning a nice suburban house with a garage, a picket fence and dog, is diminishing?  

Perhaps this is true for Sydney.

Perhaps this is Sydney’s journey to a new status where people who reside in this exceptionally-beautiful city, will now be restricted to the Haute Bourgeoisie and the Patricians. That’s not great for heterogeneity and healthy mixed communities but it might prove the making of  Sydney as a truly international destination and global city. Perhaps even the most desired antipodean destination. As the French say “qui vivra verra” - time will tell.

Indeed, time will tell and we’ll be here to witness Sydney’s remarkable journey from child to adult; from village to city; from cub to lion. That is truly exciting for all of us but maybe by then we will be the proud denizens of Wollongong.

Read more about Sydney housing affordability:

RBA affordability report paints bleak picture of first homes

Australian property "severely unaffordable": Demographia

Affordability improves, allowing first-home buyers into the market