After two years of COVID lockdowns, we're no strangers to being stuck at home, unable to move.

But staying at home is actually a decades-long trend in Australia.

Why has this happened?

Let's take a look.

The lucky country (especially for mobility)

Australia ranks in the top fifth of global countries when it comes to mobility, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data from the 2016 Census.

Indeed, Australians move almost twice as much as the global average, with almost 40% of us changing addresses in the five years before the 2016 Census and 15% moving house in the year prior.

In comparison, the global average for yearly moves is 8% and for five-yearly moves, it's 21%. 

Move changes during the decades

As noted, our internal migration figures - or, moves within Australia - have seen major declines in the past four decades, particularly since the 1990s.

And this is not just an Australian trend but one that's being seen in many first-world, Western countries including the US and some of Europe.

The article this blog is based on noted while there was a slight increase in Australia's interstate moving numbers in the early 1990s, intrastate moves have essentially known nothing but declines between 1981-2016.

1990s-2000s

In this period, Australian moves dropped 10%, with the ABS noting long-distance move declines were "even more pronounced".

"Moves between Australian cities and regions declined by 25% and moves between states and territories (fell) by 16%," the ABS said.

2000-2019

However, 2016 Census data also noted a "modest rise" of 5.1% in Australian moves between 2011-2016, largely due to moves within capital cities.

"Over the same period, longer distance moves between cities and regions continued to decline, while moves between states and territories reached a plateau," the ABS said.

NB: We think it's worth noting that the 1980s and 1990s were extremely tricky times in Australia's economy, not least of which were record high interest rates of 17.5% in 1990.

All of these issues may well have promoted the declination in house moves - or not.

The Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey - which follows the long-term lives of 17,000 Australians - noted last year that the moves of both owner-occupiers and tenants dropped 27% between 2002-2019.

Moving during COVID

One of the major moving changes in 2020-2022 was the fleeing of cities to regional areas as well as the change to remote working.

And of course, major border closures and lockdowns meant moving - especially interstate - was restrictive and difficult, to say the least.

A December 2020 report by the Federal Government's Centre for Population aimed to produce internal migration figures for what was an extremely tricky and constantly changing situation.

"The projection assumptions for interstate migration are summarised  ... but the forecast declines in the level of interstate migration in 2019–20 and 2020–21 are among the largest year-on-year falls on record," the report noted.

In May 2021, the ABS announced that the rush to the regions to escape city lockdowns was the highest on record with 233,000 people moving to the country in the 2020 calendar year.

"This resulted in a net gain of 43,000 people for the regions, up from 18,900 in 2019," the ABS said.

Regional Queensland enjoyed the highest net intake of movers (17,000) - well ahead of Victoria (13,400) and New South Wales (12,700).

Melbourne's longest shutdowns in the world unsurprisingly led to the state's first ever net interstate loss. More than 60,000 people left Victoria, the biggest outflow over a six-month history in records dating back to 1981.

Why are we no longer moving (as much)?

All is definitely not as it seems when it comes to our moving changes over the years.

Firstly, the reasons for moving are often picked as employment-based (ie due to a change in jobs).

But in actual fact, it's the unemployed rather than the employed that change addresses the most, according to the ABS, with 20% of unemployed Aussies moving in the year prior to the 2016 Census - as compared to 14% of employed movers.

The HILDA Survey concurred, stating that "work and study reasons represented a relatively low share of the reasons people move".

The survey also noted that the most commonly reported reasons for moving are:

• To get a better place (including one in a better neighbourhood or closer to amenities) 
• Getting a place of my own 
• Work or study reasons

Talking employment, Aussies' occupations also make no difference to resident movements although some industries - such as mining and Defence Force jobs - may see such movement changes.

But it's the long-term move figures - and the reasoning for them - that have "migration scholars" concerned and scratching their heads, particularly this knowledge will strongly assist in planning infrastructure and housing in the future.

The ABS has suggested the following for such figures:

• The impact of population ageing, with older people less likely to move than younger people
• The increase in dual-income households making it more difficult for couples to relocate
• Worsening housing affordability keeping young people in the parental home for longer
• The substitution of permanent movements by temporary forms of mobility such as fly-in fly-out arrangements
• The maturation of the Australian space economy, making long-distance moves less attractive

Yet a May 2022 report from the Journal of Population Research suggested there could be "more profound behavioural changes driven by social, economic, and technological transformations" at work in the movement figures of the past four decades.

According to the report's authors, the reasons given by ABS of an ageing population and a growth in dual-income couples are compensated by an increase in "mobile" groups such as tertiary-educated singles, immigrants and renters.

However, despite studying several hypotheses around the above reasoning, the report essentially found that "no single reason underpins the overall decline in internal migration".

"The decline in migration is not driven by a single reason and cannot be explained by the behavioural change of any groups," the report noted.

It did state however that "most migration drivers have remained constant over time" and also noted that the lack of "behavioural change" could in fact be due to other reasons such as an increasing "place attachment".

This attachment - or the increased "rootedness" of people being more reluctant to move because of their attachment to nearby friends, families and community - was first noticed in the US and is thought to be one of the reasons for the internal migration decline.

As well, the Journal noted that another potential reason for falling moving figures could be increasing house prices, with this trend only growing since the 1990s.

What about you?

So, where are you in all these moving house figures?

You may be one of the many still planning to move this spring because of a new job or to enjoy more "rootedness".

Or perhaps you're hoping this will be your last move as you're feeling your senior pain more these days.

Whatever your situation, Moving Loop can help you, whether that's finding you a removalist to move house, ensuring the power is on the moment you walk through the front door, helping you get a better deal energy deal - even if you're not moving, or getting you a better internet deal. 

Make your way to Moving Loop for your moving needs and to compare, switch and start saving!