The Elephant in the Room
The property podcast for the thinking person.

Episodes

Episode 420: Simon Kuestenmacher: What Demographics Reveal About Housing and Economic Pressure Points

Australia’s housing debate has a favourite villain: migration.

From headlines about the housing crisis to claims that population growth is overwhelming supply, the conversation is often loud, emotional, and overly simplistic. But when you strip away the noise and look closely at Australian housing market data, a more complex — and far more uncomfortable — picture emerges.

In this episode, we unpack what Australia’s demographic shifts are really telling us about population growth and housing demand, cities, and economic pressure points. Rather than asking whether migration is good or bad, the conversation focuses on how population data and housing outcomes actually interact — and why blaming migrants often distracts from the deeper structural forces shaping the system. Questions like is migration causing high house prices? sound intuitive, but the data tells a much more nuanced story.

To explore this, Veronica Morgan and Chris Bates are joined by demographer Simon Kuestenmacher, co-founder of The Demographics Group.

Simon brings the discussion back to first principles, examining how population change, migration settings, household formation, and workforce dynamics interact to shape housing outcomes over decades — not election cycles. He reframes the impact of migration on housing as one variable within a broader system that includes planning constraints, construction capacity, and long-term demographic momentum, challenging some of the most entrenched assumptions behind the housing crisis in Australia.

Drawing on population data and housing trends, Simon explains why cutting migration doesn’t reliably lower house prices, why migration and housing supply are often oversimplified, and how population growth and housing demand actually influence outcomes over time.

The conversation also explores how demographic forces are shaping the Australia property market outlook, inflation pressures, and the Australia property market forecast, with implications for urban planning, workforce dynamics, and even debates around AI and unemployment.

00:00 – What Demographics Say About Housing Demand

01:12 – Why Population Data Beats Property Headlines

01:51 – The Migration Debate: Benefits and Misunderstandings

02:47 – International Students: Cash Cows or Future Workforce?

06:32 – Why Australia’s Skills Shortage Is Structural

13:44 – The Fiscal Reality Behind High Migration Numbers

17:36 – How Migration Policy Could Actually Be Fixed

22:03 – Why Migration Isn’t the Real Cause of High Prices

28:57 – The Integration Challenge for International Students

31:25 – Why Australia’s Economic Model Still Works

33:43 – Density, Sprawl, and the Real Cost of Bad Planning

45:01 – AI Will Push Workers Back Into Offices

48:34 – Why Demographics Point to Stickier Inflation

50:04 – Why Median House Prices Are a Misleading Metric

52:11 – The Big Demographic Blind Spots Investors Miss

About the Guest

Simon Kuestenmacher is a demographer and co-founder of The Demographics Group, where he specialises in population change, migration, generational trends, and how these forces shape housing, infrastructure, and economic outcomes. His work is widely used by governments, planners, and businesses grappling with long-term structural change rather than short-term noise.

Simon is a regular media commentator, a columnist for The Australian and The New Daily, and host of the Demographics Decoded podcast. He is also the author of several books on maps and data and runs one of the world’s largest social media platforms dedicated to demographic insights, reaching millions each month.

Known for translating complex population data into practical insight, Simon brings clarity to some of Australia’s most emotionally charged debates — including housing affordability, migration policy, and the future of work.

Resources:

Chris Bates