The NSW Government has developed a comprehensive package of measures designed to improve housing affordability across NSW. The package aims to give home buyers a fair go by:
Helping first home buyers
The NSW Government recognises that first home buyers face increasing hurdles to
get into the market, with rising prices, onerous deposits and competition from local
and overseas investors. Under the NSW Government’s plan, from 1 July 2017 first home buyers will see:
• Savings of up to $24,740 through the abolition of stamp duty for all new and existing
homes up to $650,000, with stamp duty discounts for homes up to $800,000
• $10,000 First Home Owners Grant will be available to builders of new properties
worth up to $750,000 and purchasers of new properties worth up to $600,000
• Savings of about $2,900 on the purchase of an $800,000 home through the
abolition of insurance duty on lenders’ mortgage insurance.
• Doubling of the foreign investor surcharge from four per cent to eight per cent
on stamp duty and a rise from 0.75 per cent to 2 per cent on land tax.
• The abolition of the off-the-plan transfer duty concession for residential purchasers by investors.
Boosting supply
As former Reserve Bank of Australia governor Glenn Stevens says, the “supply side
of the market in general has struggled to keep up with demand”. While the NSW
Government has doubled housing completions since coming to government, more
needs to be done because the previous NSW Government’s inaction resulted in an
undersupply of dwellings in Sydney of 100,000 homes.
The NSW Government will ensure that housing is opened up in the right areas and with the right type of homes while preserving local character. The plan will increase housing supply through:
• Greater use of independent panels for some councils to ensure development
applications are done efficiently and to ensure the integrity of the planning
process.
• Fast tracking approvals for well-designed terraces, dual occupancies and town
houses through complying development.
• Accelerating the development of Priority Precincts and Priority Growth Areas to
deliver an additional 30,000 homes in carefully chosen areas.
• Providing up to $2.5 million to individual councils to accelerate the development
of new Local Environment Plans that open up new housing areas.
Accelerating infrastructure
Increasing housing supply is only possible if there is adequate new infrastructure
to service new homes and support growing communities, such as roads, transport
links and parklands. The NSW Government will commit to a $3 billion Housing
Infrastructure Program that will ensure funding is allocated to infrastructure projects
that open up the development of new homes, in the right areas across Greater
Sydney and key regional centres, and at reasonable prices. The plan will accelerate infrastructure delivery by:
• Allocating $1.6 billion in new and reprioritised funds for priority capital programs,
largely through an expanded Housing Acceleration Fund.
• Expanding the Special Infrastructure Contribution levy to 10 new areas to ensure
developers are funding their fair share of infrastructure.
• Increasing or removing caps on the Section 94 infrastructure contributions that
councils can charge developers to fund the infrastructure necessary to open up
housing.
• Spending $369 million over three years to fund local infrastructure in certain high
growth council areas.
• Releasing new guidelines to help the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal
(IPART) and councils assess infrastructure costs where they exceed $30,000 a
dwelling in greenfield areas and $20,000 elsewhere.
• Subsidising councils’ interest costs to encourage them to raise $500 million to
deliver more infrastructure.