Federal election 2025: Anthony Albanese banks the house on young voters with first-home buyer pledge

First-home buyers won’t have to save for as long or pay tens of thousands for mortgage insurance under a major Labor pitch to young voters that also comes with a $10 billion promise to directly build new housing just for them.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will unveil the mammoth housing promise at his national campaign launch in Perth on Sunday, saying the moves will help fix a housing crisis that’s been a generation in the making.

“I want to help young people and first-home buyers achieve the dream of home ownership,” he said.

“We have a plan to get more Australians into their own homes — this is in stark contrast to Peter Dutton who wants to cut billions from housing.”

Under the two-part plan, the Government will spend $10 billion in grants, zero-interest loans and equity investments to build 100,000 affordable homes reserved for first-home buyers. This is direct funding and is separate from the Housing Australia Future Fund.

State Governments will throw in another $2 billion for the developments and will have to guarantee fast-tracked planning processes for construction on mostly publicly owned land.

The aim is to start the first construction in 2026-27 and have people move in from mid-2027.

The second policy prong opens up the existing deposit guarantee scheme to all first-home buyers, meaning they only need to pull together a 5 per cent deposit. The only limitation is a cap on the purchase price.

The Home Guarantee Scheme was originally set up by the Morrison government to offer 10,000 places a year, that were quickly filled.

Labor expanded this to 50,000 places and is now promising that all first-home buyers will be eligible, if it is re-elected.

Housing Minister Clare O’Neil described it as a “massive game changer”.

“For many young people, the problem is they can service a mortgage but they’re stuck in a rental and they can’t save a deposit while they’re paying off someone else’s mortgage,” she said.

“This is all about reducing the time it takes to save from between 10 to 11 years to somewhere around two to three years.”

For an $820,000 house — the median price across the country — first-time buyers would only need a deposit of $41,000. The Government says the last time you could buy a house with $41,000 covering the 20 per cent standard deposit was in 2002, demonstrating the “generational scale of this change” in the market.

It also wants to make sure parents don’t feel compelled to lend money to their adult children to buy homes and can instead use the funds for their own retirements.

About 80,000 people are expected to use the guarantee each year, out of a total 110,000 first-home buyers.

The measures add to Labor’s existing Housing Australia Future Fund spending on social and affordable housing and its Help to Buy shared equity scheme based on WA’s Keystart.

The Government has set a target of building 1.2 million new homes in five years.

But at this stage, the nation will fall 160,000 homes short of this target, according to new Master Builders Australia data.

The peak body said construction could pick up but only with concerted effort from governments at all levels, not just “piecemeal” measures.

“We’re still tinkering at the edges. It’s time to take the foot off the brake and put in place the reforms and investment needed to properly unlock supply,” chief executive Denita Wawn said.

Mr Albanese will cap off a three-day visit to WA with his campaign launch at the Perth Convention Centre on Sunday in a replica of his 2022 election-winning formula.

Minister and Cowan MP Anne Aly is expected to introduce him at the event.

He said three years ago people questioned his decision to hold the launch in the west, but it underscored his intention to govern for the whole of the country and WA’s importance.

“I’m back here again in WA because guess what? WA is not just still important, it’s more important than ever, given the changes in the economy and the opportunity that is here in WA,” he said.