Why have we prepared the Draft Housing Strategy? (Don't have time to read the full strategy? You can read the Summary here)

The Ballarat municipality is expected to grow by up to 55,000 new residents by the year 2041, and our new residents will need about 29,000 new dwellings of different types and sizes to call home. We want to ensure we achieve a balanced approach for managing residential growth while also maintaining the valued character and natural features of our city and townships.

The Ballarat Housing Strategy will provide clarity to the community, development industry, and other stakeholders about the kind of housing development they can expect to see in our municipality. We have a responsibility to ensure the needs of our growing and changing population are met in a way that is sustainable, equitable, and in line with community values.

The City of Ballarat has sought advice from demographers, economists, planners, and urban designers to help inform the draft Housing Strategy, along with our existing strategies and plans. The range of technical documents that have been prepared are available to view in the Document Library section on the right-hand side of this webpage.

Growth Areas

The City of Ballarat is continuing to work with the Victorian Planning Authority and the Department of Transport and Planning to determine the appropriate staging and release of new growth areas to the North and West of Ballarat.

Find your Address

If you would like to find what Neighbourhood Character Area your home is in, you can search by address here. (Please note that properties in non-Residential Zones are not covered by the Housing Strategy, so no search result will be returned for these properties.)

Next Steps

Consultation on the draft Housing Strategy occurred in late 2023.

A number of submissions were received and are currently under review. Changes to the housing strategy will be presented to Councillors before another round of community consultation in 2024.

The final Housing Strategy will, ultimately, support changes to Zones and Overlays across the Municipality, and consultation on this work will commence in the coming months.

Please contact the Strategic Planning team on strategicplanning@ballarat.vic.gov.au or 5320 5500 if you have questions regarding the Draft Housing Strategy and the supporting documents.