who is to blame

Very Interesting discussion about world affordability of housing on this site http://www.demographia.com/

The section lower down titled "Housing affordability & related policy" is very thorough.

This power point file http://www.demographia.com/dhi2.ppt is quite disturbing and lays the blame on restrictive government planning practices. According to this study, western governments did not address increasing demand as they should have. They should have allowed more land to be zoned for new development to meet demand.

Also restrictions in allowing building to progress adds to the costs as it slows the flow of supply.

The Victorian state government recently announced large tranches of land for development in the hope of easing the supply/demand ratio. I hope it helps.

The fuel prices are a problem though. If we are truly wanting to provide more land we need to make it attractive to live there and that means (among other things) better public transport to those areas.

Personally, I think we need to see social changes as well. More people per household (does grandma really have to live in retirement home? Do the kids really have to move out so early?) and smaller floor space with more units close to train stations and waterways.

Ultimately, having more persons per square metre of land will make housing more affordable but I don't know how long it will all take.

Failing all that, how do we get people to live in smaller towns in inland rural areas?