International students ‘not the culprits’ of rental crisis in Australia, study claims
International students are not responsible for Australia’s rental crisis and should not be “scapegoated”, a new study claims.
International students are not responsible for Australia’s rental crisis and should not be “scapegoated” by politicians and media, a new study claims.
Researchers from the University of South Australia have conducted new analysis, thought to be the first of its kind in Australia, which found no relationship between international student numbers and rising rental costs for local residents.
The study by Associate Professor Guanglun Michael Mu and Dr Hannah Soong, published in The International Journal of Higher Education Research, looked at data from 76 time points from 2017 to 2023 at the national level and 79 time points from 2017 to 2024 at the capital city level.
They concluded that international student numbers had a negligible impact on rental supply in most major cities, instead citing structural issues in the housing market as a primary cause of lower supply.
“Our study revealed that international students were not the culprits of the rental crisis in Australia,” they wrote.
Associate Professor Mu said a phenomenon of “politicisation of international studentification” had emerged in Australia.
“These political discourses come on top of a raft of other policy initiatives, including doubling student visa fees, tightening migration schemes, and proposing legislation to cap international student admissions for higher education providers,” he said in a statement.
“These policy initiatives could exacerbate the housing crisis by cutting a significant revenue source that underwrites universities’ capital works, including student accommodation infrastructures.”
The study found that in none of the Australian capital cities could the rising weekly rental cost post-Covid be attributed to the increasing number of international students.
“It was only in Adelaide and Hobart that a correlation between growing international student numbers and a decreasing rental vacancy rate was found,” Dr Soong said.
“It is important to note that with the growth of international student numbers, the weekly rental cost tends to drop. Specifically, at the national level, for every increase of 10,000 international students, there would be a corresponding decrease of $2 in weekly rental cost.”
The researchers said the findings showed “international students only constitute a tiny piece of the puzzle in the rental crisis and are not the main competitors in the rental market”.
They highlighted a previous study which indicated only 11-15 per cent of international students in Sydney reported seeking private rentals, while the most prominent source of accommodation information was the university housing website.
In another study, “interviews with international students in South Australia revealed their non-competitiveness in the private rental market due to lack of recognised rental history and credit, which forced them to choose compact, overpriced student accommodation”.
“To manage housing unaffordability, many had to opt for shared bedroom,” they wrote.
“In this respect, the forced housing choices of international students do not exacerbate but alleviate pressure on the rental market. This may be a reason why, at the national level, our study found a statistically significant negative relationship between international student number and rental cost.”
A similar study last year by the Student Accommodation Council — part of the national Property Council lobby group — also claimed international students had “unfairly worn the blame for Australia’s rental crisis” but they were “not the cause” either of rising rents or low vacancies, making up just 4 per cent of renters nationwide.
Speaking at Australia’s first “People’s Commission into the Housing Crisis” last May, a trio of foreigners living in Australia slammed the “narrative” that they were to blame.
“What I find appalling is the narrative that migrants and international students … are being scapegoated as the cause of the housing crisis,” said Raf Rayos, a student from the Philippines.
Valentina Olivares, a Chilean migrant worker who originally came to Sydney as a student, stressed “we make a massive contribution to revenue”.
“I would ask politicians and the community to think about what would happen if we all [went on strike] for just one day,” she said.
Ashrika Paruthi, an international student officer at the University of Sydney, said being scapegoated was “unjust and misguided”.
The number of international students in Australia totalled 853,045 in 2024, according to Education Department figures, a 9 per cent increase on 2023.
International students have made up the lion’s share of the country’s record high migration since Covid, leading to growing concern about the impact on cost-of-living and housing affordability.
Property research firms including CoreLogic and PropTrack have previously correlated overseas migration with rising rents.
A CoreLogic analysis last April found migration “hot spots” which received the highest numbers of overseas arrivals the prior year saw corresponding rental increases in some cases of nearly 30 per cent
“The biggest short-term impact in areas that experience a rapid influx of overseas migration is in the rental market,” CoreLogic head of research Eliza Owen said in the report.
“Research from the ABS [suggests] around 60 per cent of recent permanent migrant arrivals rented in Australia in the five years to 2021, and Census data in 2021 showed around 65 per cent of temporary migrants were renters.”
A report from PropTrack this month found rental affordability in Australia has plunged to its lowest level on record, with households earning a median income of roughly $116,000 able to afford just 36 per cent of rentals advertised from July to December.
Labor last year introduced a number of tougher rules including higher English-language requirements and doubling of visa fees, but an attempt to cap international student numbers through legislation was defeated by the Coalition and the Greens.
Last month a record 201,490 people came to Australia on student visas, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), 15 per cent higher than last year.
Net overseas migration, or the difference between long-term arrivals and departures, hit a record 536,000 in 2022-23 before dropping to 446,000 in 2023-24, well above the Albanese government’s target of 395,000.
Both major parties have promised to rein in the numbers, which have largely been driven by a flood of international students on temporary visas — a significant proportion of whom go on to seek permanent status.
Of the 446,000 in 2023-24, international students were the largest group on 207,000, while India was the top source of migrants.
Net overseas migration in the September 2024 quarter was more than 89,000.
At current levels, net overseas migration is on track to reach roughly 359,200 by June 2025, according to analysis by the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA), or more than 38 per cent above the government’s 2024-25 budget forecast and higher than its revised MYEFO forecast of 341,700.
“The Prime Minister is setting Australia up for an economic and humanitarian disaster,” IPA director of research Morgan Begg said in a statement earlier this week.
“Failing to rein in unsustainable migration intakes actively undermines Australians who are struggling with rapidly rising house prices and rental costs. It is also fuelling high inflation and a per capita recession.”
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