Leon Byner:
Assistant Treasurer, Michael Sukkar joins us now. How much is it?
Minister Sukkar:
Morning, Leon. Yes, look the HomeBuilder program at present has a $25,000 grant and that will run until the 31st December. We’ve extended it for three months to the 31st March so from 1st January to 31st March, it will be at $15,000 and we think that that’s still a big incentive for people to purchase a new home which is obviously so important to support our residential construction industry which employs up to one million Australians.
Leon Byner:
If you apply in December, do you get the $25,000 or the $15,000?
Minister Sukkar:
If you sign your contract between now and 31st December, you’ll get $25,000, if you sign a contract after then – so from 1st January onwards – and you meet all the other criteria, it’s $15,000.
Leon Byner:
You know that there’s going to be a run on this, don’t you?
Minister Sukkar:
Inaudible...When the pandemic first hit, the industry was talking about a valley of death, hundreds of thousands of jobs being at risk. This has saved those jobs but we also wanted to make sure that people had a sense of urgency and that people needed to make that decision and so we’re very comfortable and in fact quite enthusiastic about the prospect that people will need to get a move-on if they want the $25,000. But having said that, if you’re only going to be ready to do so in the new year, well you’ll still get $15,000 which goes a long way to supporting home ownership.
Leon Byner:
So your message is, be quick and try and get the $25,000, but if you miss out you’ll still get the $15,000? Is that right?
Minister Sukkar:
Correct. The alternative, Leon, is that the program ended on 31st December and if you didn’t make it then you got nothing. We think that this extension, again, will support the pipeline of residential construction all the way through 2021, into 2022, that’s what it is primarily designed to do, and along the way, we’re seeing particularly first home buyers but also younger families taking advantage of this. I must say South Australia is one of the markets that has probably in proportionate terms, seen the largest increase in uptake when we look at the new home sales data. So South Australia has been a huge beneficiary and in many respects we’re really pleased with how the South Australian market is going and we know that through the South Australian Master Builders Association that it is actually one of the markets where lots of builders have actually employed more people. Not just maintained their current staff but employed more people and that obviously has benefits throughout the South Australian economy.
Leon Byner:
Michael Sukkar, Assistant Treasurer, thank you.