Whether renting or trying to buy a first home, the housing market is an increasingly horrible place for most Australians. House prices have roughly tripled since the ’80s and rental increases aren’t trailing far behind.

The impact is being borne disproportionately by younger generations. In the last four decades, homeownership among people aged twenty-five to thirty-four on the lowest incomes crashed by 40 percent. And even if you discount income and class background, for everyone under the age of forty, homeownership has been dropping significantly. Unable to afford mortgage deposits and crippling repayment schedules, poorer millennials are watching the possibility of homeownership slowly recede over the horizon.

At the same time, housing policies from both major parties have largely failed to make housing any more affordable. Anthony Albanese’s government recently launched its “one million homes” policy, but Parliamentary Library analysis suggests that it may only build 187 affordable homes.