A Place to Live, A Place to Stay

Part 3 in a series of opinion pieces exploring how the Illawarra can shape its own future… together. By Neil Reilly, a former mayor of Kiama.

There’s a saying that home is where the heart is, but lately the heart seems to be absent in real estate.

Everywhere you look, the pressure is on — rents climbing, properties shrinking, first-home dreams vaporising.

In the Illawarra, the struggle to just to find a place to live is becoming ever more difficult.

For years, our region has drawn people for all the right reasons: beauty, community, accessibility, and a sense of balance. But the same things that make the Illawarra desirable also make it fragile.

When housing becomes scarce and speculative, it changes the social fabric. The teacher, the nurse, the apprentice, the cafe worker, the people who make community work, start to slip away.

We are not alone in facing this. From Hobart to the Hunter, regional centres across Australia are feeling the same pinch: too few homes, too little diversity, too much delay. The reality is, having somewhere you can call home is a keystone of security. It does have financial implications, but first and foremost, it’s for physical and mental wellbeing. In the Illawarra, we have the advantage of scale and spirit. We can do this differently and better.

Building for People, Not Just Property

A place to live should be more than a property transaction. It should be a promise: that people of all ages, incomes, and backgrounds can find their footing here. That means thinking beyond raw numbers and approvals. It means looking at design, density, and diversity together.

• Design that fits our landscape. That is compact, beautiful, and sustainable. The goal is not to replicate Sydney, but to refine the Illawarra’s coastal village character.
• Density that respects both space and sense. Gentle density duplexes, terraces, and small-scale apartments near transport can keep families close without eroding charm.
• Diversity of housing types that include key-worker rentals, accessible dwellings, and adaptive re-use of older buildings. A healthy town is a mixed town.

Too often, planning debates descend into a contest of “for” or “against” development. The real conversation should be about how — how do we design for belonging, how do we grow gracefully, how do we balance old and new?   

Housing as Infrastructure

When we talk about infrastructure, we picture roads and pipes. But housing is infrastructure too, social, economic, and emotional.

Without it, nothing else works. Employers can’t attract staff, services falter, families move on. A well-housed community is a productive one.

That’s why we need to see housing as a shared regional responsibility, not just a market outcome. Councils can streamline processes and champion design quality. State government can align zoning with real need. Communities can contribute ideas instead of outrage.

And all of us can keep asking the same question: Will this make the Illawarra a better place to live and to stay?

The Regional Dividend Connection

This is also where the Regional Basic Dividend idea can make a difference. Imagine using part of that dividend to lower the cost of building and renting homes that serve community purpose.

Funds from renewable projects could help retrofit old stock for energy efficiency or underwrite social housing managed by trusted local providers. It’s one more way to turn economic change into social gain.

Practical Steps Now

• Support adaptive reuse — turning disused buildings into homes or creative spaces.
• Encourage councils to adopt design excellence panels that prize liveability, not just height or yield.
• Back local builders and apprenticeships to keep housing supply and skills within the region.
• Ask developers the simple question: Would you live here yourself?

The Illawarra is blessed with beauty and brains, but its greatest strength has always been belonging.

A place to live is important. A place to stay, to raise families, build friendships, and grow old with dignity is what truly matters.

We can’t preserve the Illawarra by freezing it in time, but we can shape its growth so that everyone still has a home in the story.