At the Community Housing Industry Association we believe that social and affordable rental housing should be recognised as essential infrastructure, essential that is to individual households, the community and the wider economy.

The arguments we make for ongoing investment in new social and housing need to recognise and value the benefits it brings So it was a great pleasure to launch SIGMAH  a new tool that calculates the social, economic and environmental benefits from new social and affordable housing projects. The tool was developed by Associate Professor Christian (Andi) Nygaard and Dr Trevor Kollmann both at Swinburne University of Technology.

It is the outcome of four years of CHIA-initiated research and development led by the Centre of Urban Transitions at Swinburne University of Technology, with input from the Australian Social Value Bank and original work by Simetrica Jacobs to develop wellbeing values for green infrastructure. The approach to social valuation has been peer reviewed and the report setting out the research etc underpinning the tool is available here.   

It allows us to understand how much less public expenditure a government will incur from areas such as health, policing, and community services by making homes available to those who need them. The tool also estimates private benefits such as higher consumption, income and educational attainment. In addition, it estimates environmental benefits from provision of green spaces, dwelling designs and access to transport options and measures the dollar value of lower CO2 estimates due to the energy performance of new dwellings.

CHIA wants to thank IFM Investors for hosting the launch, Josh Burns MP for opening the event and our speakers Carla De Campo from IFM, Hugh Hartigan, NHFIC (The National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation), and Erin Dolan at the Lord Mayor’s Charitable Foundation. Big thank also to Min Seto from Australian Social Value Bank for her major contribution to the tool.

A shout out too to our other funders Infrastructure Australia, Shelter NSW, Community Housing Industry Association NSW, Community Housing Industry Association of South Australia, Advance Housing, Infrastructure SA, SSROC, and CHIA NT.

The tool and resources are available to download here.

We will also be holding a sector briefing and will provide details soon.