As housing affordability continues to be an issue for many Australian’s, property expert Ian Ugarte urges us to rethink the Great Australian Dream of the four bedroom, 246sqm home and consider smaller housing and multi-generational living as an option for the future.
In the clips above and below, Deborah Hutton asks Ian about the solution to the housing affordability crisis when young adults priced out of the market are staying at home and creating greater stress for homeowners who have the added pressure of taking care of their own ageing parents.
Do we need a new type of Great Australian Dream
Ian’s solution is focused on multi-generational and circle of life housing. “There are policies across the country promoting that those 25-year-olds don’t have to live with their parents because if you create the right product for it, they will move out,” says Ian.
He believes that there needs to be a change in public perception when it comes to the development of “new generation boarding houses” as a solution to providing affordable housing. “As soon as we say boarding house, the automatic perception is that there’s going to be drug dealers.”
“It’s not the case, that might have been a 1960’s perception, but we’ve changed and the policy is actually driven to help those 25-year-olds, to help those 50 and 70-year-old people that don’t need a full house,” he goes on.
“The emotion of the community really needs to take context of actually what’s really needed in the community,” says Ian before discussing the concept of circle of life living and the benefits to housing affordability and community for multi-generations.
One man, five women… one bathroom
Ian Ugarte and his family are proof that a large family can live happily in a “small” space. To live congruently with his small housing projects, Ian, his wife Christine and their four daughters moved from a four-story, 400sqm home into a two bedroom, one bathroom 72sqm property.
Speaking to Balance, Ian says: “What happened in the first couple of weeks, I noticed our interactions had changed. We started to talk to each other, we started to argue more but we had to sort it out because we had to cross paths,” said Ian.
Check out the clips to find out how Ian now deals with sharing a small space, and one bathroom with five women and if he ever “wins”?
“I think the answer to that is that you don’t win. The answer to that is that everyone can win as long as you know where you stand.”
