Look anywhere in Australia and you'll see a housing market under intense pressure.
It makes the federal government's goal of a million homes under a new Housing Accord sound like welcome relief.
But there's a lot in the detail here — so let's break down what's happening.
Tell me what's been promised
Even the budget documents call the 1 million dwellings an "aspirational" target, with the federal government itself only locked in for an extra 10,000 homes (and it won't start until mid-2024).
They'll spend $350 million over five years to do that, with the states and territories on the hook to support up to 10,000 more — that takes us to 20,000 under the deal.
Ok, so how *could* we get to 1 million homes?
That's where private-sector stakeholders come in, mainly superannuation funds looking for investments, that would build other homes.
But Treasurer Jim Chalmers said while some funds had signed up to this "big, ambitious target", there was still more work to do.
He said it was all a plan to help tackle one part of the market — the lack of affordable rental properties.
"We want to find that part of the market where low vacancy rates and high rents are pricing people out of the market," he said.
But the federal government has to make these projects commercially attractive.
Enter a "small availability payment" from the federal government, which will help cover the gap between market rates and what people can afford.
Where will these houses be?
We don't know yet, but they're not limited to the cities.
Mr Chalmers said regions around Australia needed them too, and the project wasn't limited to major metro areas.
"We need people to be able to live near where the jobs are," he said.
The states will also need to find and free up land in good locations.
Why are we waiting until 2024?
We know the homes under the accord will have to be new, have at least 7-star energy efficiency and be "well located" — that's near shops, transport, schools and other key infrastructure.
But the five-year rollout clock doesn't start ticking until mid-2024, so why are we waiting almost two years to start it?
The government says that's because of supply constraints at the construction end — essentially, that'll be when the rate of building activity is predicted to decline.
"There's a heap of activity in the sector [now] … we need to deal with the skills and labour shortages, we need to deal with the supply shortages," Mr Chalmers said.
But it's not the only spend in the budget for affordable homes.
This accord adds to another plan for 20,000 social houses over five years, already allocated under a $10 billion housing future fund, and another 10,000 affordable homes for frontline workers from the same fund.
I'm older and want to downsize. Anything in it for me?
There might be.
If you want to sell up, the money from that will be exempt from pension asset testing for two years.
And if you want to put some of that cash into superannuation to get tax benefits, the government has lowered the age from 60 to 55.
There's also a few schemes to make it easier to buy with a smaller deposit, including Help to Buy (for low-income earners), which sees the federal government "buy in" with an equity stake in your home.
And for regional first home buyers, 10,000 people a year can buy with a 5 per cent deposit, which kicked off in October this year.
