The shadow housing minister has suggested borrowers should be able to access their superannuation as collateral for a home loan or to reduce mortgage debt.
Liberal MP Andrew Bragg has suggested that the Coalition should debate whether to allow Australians to access their superannuation before retirement if they need it to buy a home.
Speaking to the Financial Services Council on Tuesday (22 September), the shadow housing minister reiterated that he believed more needed to be done to enable Australians to buy their own home.
Echoing suggestions made earlier this month, Bragg said that super can play a larger role in supporting home ownership and could be withdrawn early if used for a mortgage.
While Bragg was lampooned by members of the Coalition for suggesting that these measures were under consideration earlier this month (given that they were not formally tabled before the shadow cabinet), the shadow minister has once again outlined his belief that Australians should be able to access their retirement savings in advance, so they can buy a home or reduce their mortgage debt.
“We must do all we can to drive up rates of home ownership,” he said.
Noting that around 32 per cent of super lump sum payments were used to pay off mortgages in 2023, according to data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), Bragg said: “This is a giant amount of money which raises questions about the cohesion of our savings, housing and retirement policy.
“We must be clear that housing sits at the heart of retirement policy alongside private savings, superannuation and the pension. Each element should work together.
“Today I want to continue the conversation the nation needs to have on how our national savings policy can help drive home ownership, especially in retirement.
“Renting is a good choice for some Australians but I don’t want it to become a mandatory design feature of our retirement system.
“I am concerned the growing trend of retired renters will change the economic and social character of the nation,” he said and suggested that retiree renters face “substantially higher housing cost pressures and poverty rates”.
The shadow housing minister said that, at retirement, Australians are best served by 1) owning a residence outright and 2) owning financial assets from which they can draw an income to replace or supplement the age pension.
“Market circumstances (exacerbated by government policy) are making it harder to meet priority 1; their income is constrained due to super contributions, and house prices inflated due to market dislocation,” he said.
“If Australians can reorient some of their super savings early in life (for example, a loan from super for residence), they can optimise their objectives…
“Why should we live in a nation where big institutions own houses by virtue of government policy but people can’t use their own money to get a home or reduce their own mortgage?”
The shadow housing minister told the Financial Services Council that “the housing crisis can only be solved with a supply side revolution” and while more housing needs to be built, he said there ‘remains a case for targeted demand side solution, like a less reckless 5% deposit scheme, and some form of a super policy which promotes home ownership”.
“The super policy will always be a better solution because the money belongs to the individual; it is not the government’s money. The individual will respect their own money 1,000 times better than Anthony Albanese treats taxpayer funds,” Bragg said.
“Until he can explain why a couple earning over $600,000 need a free government housing guarantee, then I don’t want to hear him say that ‘super for housing is bad.’
“We should apply some common sense as we evaluate these models. That is what we politicians are paid to do…
“If we cannot be creative and bold, we should all find other things to do.”
While the superannuation suggestion has not been formally adopted by the Coalition, the opposition has previously pledged to undertake a range of reforms to improve housing.
In his budget reply in May, for example, the Opposition Leader Angus Taylor said that a Coalition government would repeal Labor’s newly announced capital gains tax (CGT) and negative gearing reforms while legally tethering immigration levels to housing construction.
Other Coalition policies aimed at lifting housing supply include cutting back the National Construction Code; investing in connections infrastructure (such as roads, water, power, and sewerage); and lowering taxes aimed at lifting housing supply.
Members of the Coalition have also criticised the federal government’s ban on using SMSF LRBAs for residential property (although the Coalition has not publicly said it would repeal this ban).
Prior to the last federal election in 2025, the Coalition also pledged to bring in a super for housing scheme that would enable first home buyers to use up to 40 per cent, capped at $50,000, of their super savings for a home loan deposit. The idea had first been mooted before the 2022 election.
Where do the other political parties stand on super for housing?
Bragg’s superannuation for housing suggestion echoes a proposal from One Nation at the beginning of the month, in which the minor party said it would allow eligible owner-occupier mortgage holders and renters to redirect part of their compulsory superannuation into take-home pay.
If Pauline Hanson’s party gains power following next year’s federal election, it has pledged to allow Australians who rent or are paying down a mortgage on their principal residence to divert 3 percentage points of their 12 per cent superannuation guarantee contributions into a nominated bank account for up to three years.
However, the Albanese government has previously been hesitant to enable home buyers to access superannuation in order to pay down debt or use it as collateral for a home loan. However, borrowers are able to use their superannuation scheme to save up for a home loan deposit.
First introduced by the Turnbull Coalition government in 2017–18, the First Home Super Saver Scheme (FHSSS) allows individuals to make voluntary contributions into the superannuation system and to later withdraw those contributions (and an amount of associated earnings) to use as a deposit for the purposes of purchasing or constructing their first home.
Under the FHSSS, prospective first home buyers can make personal contributions to superannuation of up to $15,000 a year. Up to $50,000 of these contributions can then be withdrawn to finance a first home.
[Related: One Nation’s early super access for mortgagors lashed]
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