PurposeThis paper seeks to examine the opportunity for home ownership by first‐time buyers who are in occupations defined in the UK literature as key workers within four state capitals in Australia: Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane. Many of these workers are moderate or average income earners who deliver essential community services such as health, social services, education, safety and emergency services. This paper aims to explore access to home ownership for these workers for 2001 and 2009, a period which included the introduction and reintroduction of increased Australian government grants to first home buyers.Design/methodology/approachThe study determines, for each year, the zones of each city able to be afforded on a moderate single income as well as the percentage of suburbs able to be afforded by key workers.FindingsThe paper identifies the pressure for multiple incomes in order to purchase as well as discussing the commuting distances some workers in Adelaide and Sydney may have to accommodate in order to afford a home.Originality/valueThe paper follows up 2001 work, conducted in Australia, on housing affordability for moderate income earners. Housing affordability continues to be a key housing issue in Australia, especially for first home buyers.

Purpose -The introduction of higher density housing development within suburban areas has been favoured by state governments in Australia as a means of improving the efficiency of land use, reducing the costs associated with the delivery of government services and promoting home ownership. However it has been hypothesised that such development may have a negative impact on neighbourhood social structure, for example reducing diversity as measured by economic status and family makeup or in local housing market performance as measured by price. This paper aims to test this hypothesis. Design/methodology/approach -The methodology employs a quantitative approach with principal components analysis used to capture the main social structure of the Adelaide Statistical Division. Social constructs, the product of principal components analysis, are used to measure outcomes of higher density development as measured by community or household change. Findings -The results in this paper show that densification has had significant impact on certain neighbourhoods in the Adelaide Statistical Division notably in relation to their built form but not necessarily in neighbourhood structure or housing market performance.Research limitations/implications -The findings are significant in highlighting that increasing medium densities and improving tenure mix may not necessarily improve the opportunities for socio-economic mix or for cultural diversity with implications for policy makers seeking to follow strategies based on the promotion of mixed communities. Originality/value -This paper seeks to add new research on the outcomes of higher density development in Australia in three ways. First, social constructs, the product of principal components analysis, are used to measure outcomes of higher density development as measured by community or household change. Second, the paper investigates the development at the local level where impacts are likely to be most important. Third, the analysis identifies a before and after scenario for those suburbs where higher density development has been most significant.

This paper presents the findings of a study which aimed to investigate the barriers to participation in farmers' markets by the wider farming community in South Australia (SA) with a particular focus on small-to-medium-sized primary producers. While the experiences and motivations of farmers participating in markets outside Australia have been studied, there has been very little research conducted in Australia or internationally on raw food producers who remain outside the farmers' market community. Both descriptive and multivariate analysis has been undertaken in an effort to rank and summarise the factors which inhibit participation by producers in farmers' markets. Six key dimensions are identified as underlying the survey results and these are used to group producers into three clusters. Finally differences between farmers within each cluster groups are identified.

First feelings and first impressions largely govern and delimit the kinds of experiences one expects and seeks. This paper reviews the application of multidimensional scaling (MDS) to retail market research and discusses how MDS is able to map these impressions and hence explain the retail centre image held by consumers. It proposes that retail centre image is not just relevant to marketers and retailers, but is also of importance to property managers who need an informed and holistic consumer orientation in order to create and sustain property value. By means of illustration MDS is applied to data based on shopper evaluations of seven retail centre items and an interpretation the results is offered.

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