With aged care and housing likely to be hot topics today, it’s worth remembering that an obvious response to these problems continues to languish in obscurity in Australia.

Homeshare programs match up older people who have spare room with appropriate people looking for housing. The matches are made by professional social workers and monitored over time to ensure things are running smoothly and safely.

It’s such an obvious idea – match up lonely people who have big, empty houses in prime locations with (usually) younger people needing an affordable place to live near work/study.

Why isn’t it everywhere? It’s very popular. The economics of it are obvious and politicians love to talk about it – here’s Labor’s Ged Carney on our webinar, Lib Ken Wyatt hosted us in Parliament.

Part of the problem is lack of ongoing funding and political support. Also, Homeshare is, as the name suggests, all about sharing. It isn’t about buying and selling a service.

That means it doesn’t fit in well with privatised care systems like the NDIS and Australia’s current aged care system.

There are plenty of ways this could be fixed if Australia’s leaders are serious about an obvious solution to aged care and housing issues.