The COVID-19 pandemic became a turning point for Australians to become homeowners before the country's housing crisis escalated, according to new data from KPMG Australia.It estimates that from 2021 to 2025, nearly 600,000 Australian households became owner-occupiers, rising from around 490,000 over the 2016-2020 period.While the overall rate of home ownership in Australia has decreased in the last 30 years, the number of homeowners has increased significantly in that time in line with population increases.The KPMG analysis, based on Census data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), found nationally the rate of owner-occupiers dropped from 66.3 per cent in 2021 to 65.9 per cent in 2025.Queensland and Western Australia were the two states that saw the biggest leap in owner-occupiers from 2021 to 2025 Queensland recorded a 1 per cent increase in home ownership over the four-year period, and Western Australia recorded a 0.7 per cent rise.Terry Rawnsley, KPMG’s urban economist, told SBS News that the COVID-19 pandemic played a key role in the boost of home ownership in these two states."There was a period between 2020 and 2022 when there were really low interest rates, house prices hadn't really taken off much in those two states," Rawnsley said."We also had an inflow of people coming out of Melbourne and Sydney escaping COVID lockdown," he said, adding that the rise of remote working also facilitated the trend.In Sydney — the country's most expensive city to buy property in — the analysis found a decrease in the rate of home ownership, dropping from 61.1 per cent in 2021 to 59.9 per cent in 2025.Rawnsley said it was the first time since the late 1950s that Sydney recorded such a low home ownership rate