Australia has a housing problem that nobody talks about.

Two young Australians.
Combined income: $140k.
Trying to buy an $850k home.

The bank says NO.

That is the starting point.

Not after years of failure.
Not after a financial collapse.
Right now.

So the conversation turns to deposit schemes. Two percent. Five percent. Ten percent. Twenty percent. The assumption is that if young Australians can just get the deposit together, they can enter the market.

But that is not what the numbers are showing.

Prices keeps climbing.
Wages lag behind.
The gap gets worse yearly.

So the couple saves harder and waits longer.

But while they are saving, deposits keep moving, repayments keep climbing and the debt required to enter the market keeps growing.

The bank still says NO.

That is the real killer in this discussion.

A smaller deposit sounds good politically because it lowers the entry point. But the smaller the deposit, the larger the debt. The larger the debt, the more brutal the repayments become.

Again, the bank says NO.

That is why this issue is no longer just about deposits. The problem is now structural, house prices and modest wages mean that Australians simply cannot service a home loan.

They cannot catch up.

And nobody is talking about that reality.  The proposed solutions don’t work.

There is a solution.

But first we need to say what the problem is out loud.