The Australian housing affordability trap – How environmental, institutional, and structural factors can immobilize Australian households in the face of extreme weather events – A case study on flooding

With climate change a growing number of increasingly severe hazards such as floods and bushfires affect populated regions in Australia. As a result, insurance premiums rise, and hazard-prone regions might even become uninsurable. Using the example of floods, this article examines how under conditions of the Australian housing crisis these risks affect households unequally. After major floods, un- and underinsured households often lack the capacity to recover. At the same time, they become immobilized because they cannot afford to move out of regions at risk. Based on 26 semi-structured interviews with (re-) insurance, legal, financial and urban planning experts conducted in 2022, the article provides empirical insights into the under-researched interconnection of household immobilization and vulnerability to extreme weather events from an expert perspective. The experts identify four factors which combine in producing vulnerability and at the same time immobilizing people: location and urban planning, the privatization of risk, socio-economic factors as well as awareness and the distribution of information. Current political strategies address the challenge of moving people out of at-risk locations but do neither sufficiently address the housing and insurance situation nor how people’s personal attachment to a region affects their housing decision.