Precarious housing and wellbeing: a multi-dimensional investigation

Abstract

AHURIAHURI is a national independent research network with an expert not-for-profit research management company, AHURI Limited, at its centre. AHURI's mission is to deliver high quality research that influences policy development and practice change to improve the housing and urban environments of all Australians.Using high quality, independent evidence and through active, managed engagement, AHURI works to inform the policies and practices of governments and the housing and urban development industries, and stimulate debate in the broader Australian community. AHURI undertakes evidence-based policy development on a range of priority policy topics that are of interest to our audience groups, including housing and labour markets, urban growth and renewal, planning and infrastructure development, housing supply and affordability, homelessness, economic productivity and social cohesion and wellbeing.

Poverty and Australian housing: findings from an Investigative Panel

“…These costs extend the effects of poverty by worsening the precarity that individuals and households experience. This impacts, among other things, their overall and general wellbeing (Ong, Singh et al 2022). Between 2009-17, disparities in housing costs contributed heavily to maintaining the overall national poverty rate (as measured by the poverty line), when it would otherwise have declined.…”

Inquiry into housing policies and practices for precariously housed older Australians

“…Inappropriate housing in terms of affordability, physical structure, condition or location -singularly or in combination -can impact on both the physical and psychological health of older people (Faulkner and Bennett 2001;Foley, Coombes et al 2018;Howden-Chapman, Chandola et al 2011;Lawton and Nahemow 1973;Ong ViforJ, Singh et al 2022;Pearson, Windsor et al 2012;Population Reference Bureau 2017;Stafford, Gimeno et al 2008). Unaffordable housing, in particular, leads to older people going without (through limiting spending on food, heating and cooling or medications), as well as creating stress, fear, feelings of vulnerability and isolation, all of which impact adversely on a person's health and wellbeing and, at the extreme, can limit life expectancy (Colic-Peisker, Ong et al 2015;Donald 2009;Fiedler and Faulkner 2017a;Smith and Hetherington 2016;Sutherland, Bulsara et al 2021).…”

“…It is not only the cost of rents in the private sector that poses stresses for older people. An established body of literature documents the reasons why the private rental sector is unsuitable for older people: unaffordable rent levels for fixed incomes, short lease periods, poor housing standards and a lack of options for modifications to suit changing needs all impact older people's physical and mental health and wellbeing (Faulkner 2009;Fiedler and Faulkner 2017a;Jones, Bell et al 2007;Morris 2016;Ong ViforJ, Singh et al 2022;Ong, Wood et al 2019).…”

Predicting risk to inform housing policy and practice

“…That study developed definitional clarity about the interaction of critical life events, housing shocks, the household resources and 'insurances' required for household resilience to withstand income shocks associated with critical life events-as well as the possibility of both direct and indirect consequences of critical life events on living arrangements and other spheres of life. For example, recent research points to health and wellbeing impacts of the interaction of life events and housing precarity (Moloney, Weston et al 2012;ViforJ, Singh et al 2022). These and similar studies can be broadly conceptualised within the critical life event framework developed by Stone, Sharam, et al (2015) as an interaction of critical life events, limited household resources, housing shocks and indirect flow-on effects, such as poor health and wellbeing outcomes.…”