South Coast rents are half a typical wage earner's pay packet: new report

Even renters earning $100,000 per year - well above the median income - were struggling in locations across Australia, a new report shows.

Priced Out, a new report from national housing affordability advocacy group Everybody's Home, was released on March 18.

It comes as an exclusive survey by ACM, the publisher of this masthead, found cost of living pressures were the top priority for Australians in the upcoming federal election.

The new report found someone earning $40,000 a year on the South Coast could be paying 78 per cent of their weekly income on rent.

In Canberra, those earning $40,000 per year must allocate 83 per cent of their income to rent - nearly three times the 30 per cent affordability benchmark.

Even at an income of $80,000 per year, rent still consumed 47 per cent of net income, meaning middle-income earners also faced significant financial pressure.

Only those earning at least $130,000 a year could expect to pay an "affordable" rent, considered to be no more than 30 per cent of gross salary, particularly for low- to middle-income earners.

Southern Cross Housing, which helps low-income earners with social and affordable housing from the Shoalhaven to Bega and west to Snowy Monaro, said age pensioners were the hidden victims of the rental crisis.

"They'll be paying 66 to 70 per cent of their income if they're paying the average rent for a private rental," deputy chief executive Eric Coulter said.

"There would be many aged pensioners who would be paying in that region."

For the poorest people living on government benefits, they would have just $200 a week left after rent to cover every other expense, including food and electricity.

"The amount that they have left is impossible to live off," Mr Coulter said.

"We have heard stories of single people putting their pets first," he said.

"We're living in very hard times at the moment."

Everybody's Home said regional areas were no longer a safe haven from extreme rental costs.

"Our report shows that whether you're living in Wollongong, the Hunter region, Central Tablelands, Riverina, western Tasmania, or south-west Victoria, if you're earning a modest $60,000 per year, you'd have to spend between 38 and 62 per cent of your income on a typical unit," spokesperson Maiy Azize told ACM.

"People in regional areas are bearing the brunt of high rents and are having to make painful sacrifices just to keep a roof over their heads."

Everybody's Home is calling on the federal government to act.

"These findings underscore an alarming shift in Australia's housing market: rental stress is no longer confined to low-income earners," it says in the report.

"Increasingly, middle-income Australians are struggling to afford rent in the cities and communities where they work."

Weekly asking rents were based on the SQM Research weekly rents index for units in the week ending March 4, 2024, while the individual median income was based on Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data.

The analysis does not include situations where rents are shared across household members, such as partners or flatmates.