Inner Perth Has No Rentals Affordable for Nurses, Teachers or Cleaners on Award Pay, Anglicare Finds
Essential workers rental affordability in Perth: Anglicare's 2026 snapshot found 0% of inner Perth rentals affordable for nurses or teachers on award pay.
Essential workers rental affordability in Perth hit zero in the inner city this year: Anglicare Australia's 2026 Essential Workers Snapshot, released on 5 November, found no inner Perth rental listing was affordable for any of 16 occupations on award pay. The best Perth result was in the south east, where 4 per cent of listings suited a teacher.
What did the 2026 Essential Workers Snapshot find?
Ten of the 16 occupations could afford fewer than 1 per cent of rentals nationally, and affordability fell or stalled for 13 of them despite wage rises. The report is the fourth edition of Anglicare Australia's Rental Affordability Snapshot for essential workers. It reuses the listings from the main 2026 Snapshot and tests them against award pay from 1 July 2026.
The test assumes a single adult working full time on the minimum adult award rate for their job, with no study debt. Anglicare says this may overstate affordability for casual hospitality and retail staff on youth rates. It does not account for overtime or penalty rates.
| Occupation | Affordable listings (national) | Share | Change from 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| School teacher | 1,632 | 3.3% | +0.1 |
| Firefighter | 1,309 | 2.7% | -0.5 |
| Ambulance officer | 1,055 | 2.2% | -0.1 |
| Aged care worker | 837 | 1.7% | +0.1 |
| Nurse | 558 | 1.1% | -0.3 |
| Early childhood educator | 466 | 1.0% | +0.1 |
| Construction worker | 439 | 0.9% | -0.2 |
| Retail worker | 439 | 0.9% | -0.2 |
| Cleaner | 388 | 0.8% | -0.3 |
| Hospitality worker | 338 | 0.7% | -0.1 |
How does Perth compare region by region?
Inner Perth recorded 0 per cent for all 16 occupations in Anglicare's heatmap, which breaks the survey down by ABS statistical region. Perth's north west sat between 0.2 and 0.5 per cent, and the south west at 0.4 per cent for most jobs. The south east was the standout, with 4 per cent of listings affordable for teachers, firefighters, ambulance officers and aged care workers.
In Perth's north east, 1.7 per cent of listings suited those same four occupations, but nothing was affordable for a nurse, cleaner, early childhood educator or hospitality worker. Small regions have few listings, so one or two properties can move these percentages.
| Region (ABS SA4) | Nurse | School teacher | Aged care worker | Early childhood educator | Cleaner | Hospitality worker |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Perth - Inner | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Perth - North East | 0% | 1.7% | 1.7% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Perth - North West | 0.4% | 0.5% | 0.5% | 0.2% | 0.2% | 0.2% |
| Perth - South East | 2.9% | 4.0% | 4.0% | 1.8% | 1.4% | 1.4% |
| Perth - South West | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.2% |
| Mandurah | 1.0% | 2.0% | 1.5% | 1.0% | 1.0% | 0% |
| Bunbury | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| WA - Outback (South) | 3.2% | 7.2% | 6.4% | 2.4% | 2.4% | 2.4% |
Outside Perth, the Goldfields and southern outback region was the easiest place in WA for an essential worker to rent, with 7.2 per cent of listings affordable for a teacher. The Pilbara and Kimberley region, the Wheatbelt and Bunbury had no affordable listings for a cleaner, and the heatmap shows zero across every occupation in Bunbury and the northern outback.
Anglicare warns that regional affordability is a double-edged sword, because job opportunities are scarcer and living costs rise further from a major centre.
Where does WA sit against other states?
WA matched the national pattern rather than bucking it. For hospitality workers, 16 WA listings were affordable, or 0.5 per cent, unchanged from 2025. That compares with 0.7 per cent nationally, 0.8 per cent in New South Wales and 1.7 per cent in Tasmania. The Northern Territory had no affordable listings for a hospitality worker at all.
Anglicare quotes research from Everybody's Home that a worker on the national median income of $74,100 would need to spend 56 per cent of it on the national median rent. The report also cites Cotality data showing Perth and Brisbane rents closing the gap to Sydney.
What it means for Perth job seekers
Anglicare's test uses award minimums, and many Perth employers advertise above them. On 7 November 2026, Jobs In Perth listed 66 live direct nursing ads in Perth. Of the 50 newest, 43 quoted an annual salary, with a median midpoint of about $119,900. North Metropolitan Health Service posted 18 of them, and 33 of the 50 were part time. See our registered nurse salary guide for the pay bands.
Teaching ads in Perth stood at 170, with 40 of the 50 newest quoting pay and a median midpoint of about $108,000. Department of Education classroom roles advertised $88,178 to $127,737 a year.
The lowest-paid occupations in Anglicare's list are also the ones where Perth ads rarely state pay. Of 29 live hospitality ads, 25 were from a single casino operator and only 1 quoted an annual salary. Of 12 live cleaning ads, 1 of the 8 newest quoted an annual figure. Only 7 direct retail ads and 1 aged care ad were live, the aged care role paying $79,500 to $85,000. We covered the wider gap in our pay transparency report on 6 November.
For job seekers, the practical point is that location matters as much as salary. A nurse or teacher taking a Perth south east role has a wider rental pool than one in the inner city or the north east, on Anglicare's numbers.
How we reported this
- National and state figures, survey dates, method and quotes come from Anglicare Australia's Rental Affordability Snapshot: Essential Workers Report 2026 (PDF) and its 5 November 2026 media release.
- Perth and WA region percentages come from the Flourish heatmap embedded on Anglicare Australia's heat-maps page, read on 7 November 2026. Its region data was last updated on 4 November 2026 and matches the WA rows in the report's Table 3.
- Jobs In Perth figures are live direct-from-employer ads observed on 7 November 2026. Agency and aggregator ads are excluded. These are advertised vacancies, not people employed.
- Cover image: AI-generated illustration, not a photo of the event.
Sources
- Anglicare Australia: Rental Affordability Snapshot, Essential Workers Report 2026, Fourth Edition (PDF, released 5 November 2026)
- Anglicare Australia: Essential workers priced out of almost every rental home in Australia (media release, 5 November 2026)
- Anglicare Australia: Housing Affordability Across Australia heatmap (viewed 7 November 2026)
- Flourish: Anglicare essential workers heatmap data by SA4 (viewed 7 November 2026)
About this reporting
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