A Melbourne singer-songwriter's bitter-sweet pop song about Australia's real estate bubble has hit home for many young, disheartened house hunters.

Few people have the skill of expressing it so well, but Courtney Barnett's new song Depreston (a play on the northern Melbourne suburb Preston) encapsulates the frustrations of a generation who just want somewhere comfortable to live without taking on a million-dollar loan in a fragile economy.

Depreston is about accepting that you can't afford to buy within 10, 15 or even 20 kilometres of where you work, and that you can probably only afford a house needing urgent and expensive renovations.

Barnett - who grew up in Sydney and Hobart before settling in Melbourne - wrote the song while helping a friend look for a house.