With the Victorian State Budget next week there is also a risk that further tax increases will entrench this poor outcome. 

HIA Executive Director, Victoria, Keith Ryan said “The Housing Scorecard result can only be described as an indictment of the Victorian government’s approach to business and home building.  The size of the Victorian economy and the growing population should be fuelling a much stronger home building industry.  

“Little more than half a decade ago, Victoria was a leader in the Housing Scorecard. Now Victoria is well behind today’s leaders.  With government policies seemingly focused on punishing business activity and excessively taxing housing this is unlikely to improve in the foreseeable future.”

The HIA Housing Scorecard report presents analysis which ranks each of the eight states and territories based on the performance of 13 key residential building indicators against their decade average, covering detached and multi-unit building activity, renovations, housing finance and rates of overseas and interstate migration.

The number of detached homes being currently built in Victoria remains higher than other states but with weak volumes of new work entering the pipeline, the volume of work under construction has continued to shrink.  The multi-unit sector also remains insipid with an “Anywhere but Victoria” mentality discouraging investment decisions for that sector.

Mr Ryan noted that “Melbourne is almost the largest city in Australia, with one of the fastest rates of population growth in the country.  Our regional cities are expanding at a healthy rate as well.  Victoria is widely perceived as an attractive place to live.  

“In recent years the home building industry in Victoria has been hit with new and increased taxes.  These include the new windfall gains tax, an expansion of the vacant residential land tax, increases in land tax and stamp duty, along with increases in payroll tax and Workcover premiums.  

“If the government is serious about addressing the budgetary position, there is one simple solution; which is to tax less.  This will result in more homes being built.

“Despite industry hopes, it is unlikely that this year’s state budget will include any positive tax reforms.  This will be a disappointing but not surprising outcome that can only be mitigated by the government using the one positive policy tool it has left – pausing unnecessary regulatory changes” concluded Mr Ryan.

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