Late last year UDIA welcomed the NSW Government’s bold action to encourage low-rise and medium density housing in NSW but almost 12 months later and the policy has still not been finalised.
The policy was announced amid much fanfare, as it will allow more 3-6 storey apartments, and terraces, townhouses, and duplexes in accessible locations close to public transport.
“There has been significant consultation with industry, councils and the community since the announcement, but 12 months on we are still waiting to see the new planning instruments to allow mid-rise apartments,” said Stuart Ayres, CEO, UDIA NSW.
Ironically, in many of these areas low rise apartments were already permitted and the effect of this delay has been to stop housing development, not stimulate it, as land sales have all but dried up, while owners wait to see if they can capitalise on these proposed changes.
UDIA recently released its UDIA National Housing Pipeline® NSW Report which identified where underlying developer intent exists, however in this current economic climate it showed many developments are not feasible to construct. Our Making TODs Work report released in June this year, also identified that feasibility constraints are present in large numbers of the TOD tier two sites.
With NSW tipped to fall well short of its Housing Accord target of delivering 150,600 homes by 2029, UDIA implores the Government to continue to pull all the levers at hand now to bring on more housing.
“There is not a single silver bullet that will get us to our Accord target. These are all good policies, and we need to do what we can now to make sure that together they work to deliver more supply that is so desperately needed. As such we are calling on the Government to urgently finalise the low and mid-rise reforms,” said Stuart Ayres.
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Media Enquiries: Deanna Lane, Director of Media & Communications
UDIA NSW and National dlane@udiansw.com.au 0416 295 898