Jake's View | The young and the restless star on public housing list
It's fine if the under-30s want to spread their wings, but they can do so on their own without clogging a system designed to help the needy
Today a series of excerpts on the waiting list for public housing from the appendices of last month's Long Term Housing Strategy Consultation Document:
"According to administrative record, 31,700 non-elderly one-person applicants were newly registered on the WL (waiting list) in 2011/12, accounting for 51% of all new registrations during the year. At the first quarter of 2012, the number of non-elderly one-person applicants reached 88,300, representing 47% of all WL applicants."
In just two months these figures will be two years out of date, which is pushing it a little for what is meant to be a super-big public consultation. Given the trends, however, I think it certain that more than half the waiting list is now consisted of young singles.
"The average age of the newly registered non-elderly one-person applicants gradually declined from 37 in 2008 to 30 in 2012. This was mainly due to the increasing proportion of those aged below 30, which rose from 34% to 64% in the period."
Take note of how rapidly the age of new applicants dropped in just four years with all the under-30s coming in. At this rate we shall pretty soon have to rename it the student housing waiting list.
"45% of the non-elderly one-person applicants lived in private permanent housing while 23% lived in subsidised sale flats and 29% in PRH (public rental housing). Around 2% of them lived in temporary housing, quarters, institutions, etc."