The information for this article has mostly been taken from the 1988 Housing Survey and the 1997-98 Survey of Income and Housing Costs. Income units are single persons, or groups of related persons within a household whose income is assumed to be shared. Income sharing is assumed to take place within couples and between parents and dependent children. It is assumed that decisions concerning the purchase of a home are also generally made by adults in such units.
Owner occupiers are income units who own their home, with or without a mortgage.
First home buyers are a subset of owner occupiers. First home buyers are income units who bought their first home in the three years prior to the survey reference period. To be regarded as a first home buying income unit, neither the income unit reference person nor the income unit reference person's spouse could have owned a home previously in Australia. Changeover buyers are income units who bought their home within the same periods described for first home buyers. Over the last decade or so a lower proportion of young Australians have embraced home ownership than previously.