Study hard, get a degree, work, save, buy a home — that was the deal young Australians were promised. They’ve done the study part more than any generation before them. The home is the part that keeps slipping away. Here’s what the numbers show, across five charts.
Back in 1971, about half of Australians aged 25 to 29 owned their home. By 2021 it was down to roughly a third. That drop is where this story begins.
Australians aged 25–29. Source: AIHW (2023).
It’s not only that fewer young people own homes now. If you line up Boomers, Gen X and Millennials at the same ages, each generation owned less than the one before it. The pattern holds whether you look at people in their late 20s or early 30s.
Home ownership at ages 25–29 and 30–34, by generation. Source: AIHW (2023).
This is the part that doesn’t add up. Young Australians went to uni in far bigger numbers than before, but home ownership kept falling at the same time. They did more of what they were told to do, and still ended up with less.
Share of Australians aged 25–34. Sources: ABS (2025); AIHW (2023).
Note: 2001 and 2011 degree figures are approximate; home ownership is averaged across the 25–29 and 30–34 age bands.
Homes also got more expensive compared to what people earn. Australian housing is now worth more than six years of a typical household’s income, up from under three in 1990. So even buying one is a much bigger stretch than it used to be.
Housing value as a multiple of yearly household income. Source: RBA Table E2.
And this is before a single mortgage repayment. Just saving the 20% deposit now takes a young couple between five and nearly eight years for a house — the longest in Sydney. The finish line isn’t the mortgage. It’s the start line.
Years to save a 20% deposit, entry-level home, 2026. Source: Domain (2026).
I acknowledge the use of generative AI (Anthropic’s Claude) in producing this assignment. I used it as a coding and research assistant — to help debug and refine my R, ggplot2 and plotly code, to talk through chart design choices, and to help locate and verify the data sources cited in the References. All data was drawn from the original primary sources (ABS, AIHW, RBA and Domain), the story angle and editorial decisions are my own, and I reviewed and verified all figures and code before submitting.
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2025). Education and work, Australia, May 2025 (Table 35) [Data set]. https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/education/education-and-work-australia/latest-release
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. (2023). Home ownership and housing tenure. AIHW analysis of customised ABS Census data, 1971–2021. https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/australias-welfare/home-ownership-and-housing-tenure
Domain. (2026). First home buyer report 2026. https://www.domain.com.au/research/first-home-buyer-report-2026-1488035/
Reserve Bank of Australia. (2026). Household finances – selected ratios (Statistical table E2) [Data set]. https://www.rba.gov.au/statistics/tables/
Anthropic. (2026). Claude (Opus 4.8) [Large language model]. https://claude.ai