This research examined the Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA) program and the attitudes of industry to investment and participation in that program.

It questioned developers, investors, providers, prospective tenants and governments on how the SDA program will generate new supply that meets the needs and preferences of people with disability.
The SDA program provides a subsidy to support eligible individuals to meet their needs in the housing market and aims to encourage investment and growth in housing supply so as to add to the diversity of accommodation available to people with disability. It is envisaged that SDA will provide additional accommodation for 8,000 people in need of specialist disability housing. Access to SDA is determined as part of the National Disability Insurance Agency’s (NDIA) assessment process.

Most organisations currently focused on SDA opportunities are part of the not-for-profit sector. There is interest in SDA across the broader property and finance sector, but engagement is limited and appears to have waned over the past year in response to NDIA-provided advice on the types of accommodation it is seeking to support.

Government agencies, including the NDIA, need to take on a stewardship role and actively work to shape/direct the emerging SDA market. Its current position places too great a reliance on the capacity of markets to emerge by themselves. There is a clear need for government to create the conditions that make all the elements (choice, control, innovation, long-term planning/commitment, responsiveness to need/demand/aspiration) of NDIS/SDA both possible and available to the target population.