Telework, migration and housing: Evidence from Australia’s pandemic-era housing demand shifts

The rise of working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic weakened the link between workplace locations and residential choices, reshaping local housing demand. This paper estimates the effects of inflows of residents employed in teleworkable occupations on house price growth in Australia. Using near-universal administrative data on workers’ occupations and locations, combined with SA2-level property prices, asking rents and building approvals, we estimate a Bartik-style shift-share instrumental variable model based on pre-pandemic teleworkability exposure and occupation-specific internal migration shocks. Instrumented growth in residents employed in teleworkable occupations had a large positive effect on property prices – a 1% increase in residents in teleworkable roles led to a 9.3% increase in local prices in the quarter immediately after inflows are measured. The effect is concentrated in detached houses and in low-density SA2s more distant from city centres, and peaks with inflow timing. Model extensions show little effect on advertised rents, but a large increase in subsequent building approvals, suggesting greater demand was embedded in asset prices and led to an anticipated supply response. Together, the findings indicate that remote work materially reshaped housing demand across Australian cities and regions, contributing to stronger price growth in outer-suburban and amenity-rich regional areas.