In her early 20s, Kate cherished her freedom too much to let the mortgage shackles tie her down.

"I never wanted to really own a house," she said.

"For me, renting was attractive because it gave me freedom of mobility. It meant that if I needed to leave, I could.

"I didn't have to invest all of that money into repairs and maintenance, and all of those costs and taxes that property owners have to have."

Now 44 and a single mother of one, nothing seems as attractive as a home to call her own.

"My lifestyle's very different now, I have a family to support and I need more stability," she said.

'I did make that choice'

In her 20s, Kate wasn't worried about owning a home. ( Supplied )

Kate has never been a high-income earner. With a BA in fine arts, she was employed by galleries, but had to take on extra shifts in hospitality to get by.

"I'd accepted the fact that I had to make a choice between owning a home and working in a job I loved — because there's no money in that job. I did make that choice," she said.

"But that was when renting was a viable option for people on low incomes, and it no longer is in this country."

Kate fears time has run out for her, and she will never be able to save enough money to buy and pay off a house.

"If I had started saving in my 20s and maybe bought a house in my mid-30s, I would have missed the housing crisis. I'd be alright now," she said.

Australian rental market 'utterly unsuited' for secure housing

Kate is not alone.

Dr Kathleen Flanagan, a housing expert from the University of Tasmania, said many Australians now found saving for a home while renting unaffordable.

She said, historically, it was assumed Australians would rent for a couple of years, then buy their own home — but this happens less now.

"So, [traditionally] we have quite a low aged pension, and the reason for that is we assume that [pensioners] own their home outright and their housing costs are therefore very minimal," she said.

"What we're seeing now is that increasingly people on the aged pension are living in the private rental market, and we are seeing that their capacity to sustain themselves is very difficult."

Kate says renting once offered freedom. ( ABC News: Mitchell Woolnough )

Inevitably, Dr Flanagan says renters are forced to "put up with a lot".

"People are at a greater risk of living in a substandard housing or being treated poorly by their landlord," she said.

"[They] might not feel able to request basic maintenance to be done on their properties because they're concerned about the repercussions it has on their ongoing tenancy."

Dr Flanagan said Australia's rental market was "utterly unsuited" for providing long-term secure housing, and the country would do well to look towards Europe.

"In Europe, renting is much more normalised and renting is accompanied by legislative environment that supports long-term renting," she said.

"Tenants have more control over their property."

Rising prices and difficulty of saving a deposit while renting has left some Australians behind. ( ABC News: Mitchell Woolnough )

Falling behind

The Real Estate Institute of Australia (REIA) estimates that 8 million Australians across the country are renting.

REIA president Adrian Kelly said the housing problems in Tasmania should act as a warning to other states.

For example, the REIA estimates Hobart is short of 5,000 properties — driving up the demand — but the stalling of people's wages means many on lower incomes are falling behind.

"I have no doubt that that's happening right now," he said.

"Everyone's doing well and enjoying themselves, except for those people."

The only way to fix the issue, in Mr Kelly's view, is to build more homes.

"We have to do it. That's the only way. Because there's not enough homes to go around," Mr Kelly said.

To own a house, Kate thinks she would have had to start saving in her 20s. ( ABC News: Mitchell Woolnough )

'I worried myself sick'

Kate has been renting for more than three decades, and spent hundreds of dollars of "wasted" money on rent.

As rental prices in her hometown of Hobart kept skyrocketing — even surpassing those in Melbourne — she was eventually priced out of her long-term rental.

"As the rental market became increasingly mercenary, I realised that not only would I never own a house, but I may even end up homeless because I was having trouble finding houses to rent," she said.

Faced with the double whammy, anxiety took over.

"I worried myself sick. I lied awake literally every single night with insomnia, worrying about what was going to happen, how was I going to support us," she said.

Kate said the country was too fixated on achieving the "great Australian dream — the quarter-acre block", leaving it geared towards serving the investors.

"It's very much you're living in someone's investment property and you're paying off their mortgage," she said.

"That's such part of our cultural narrative that it hasn't left any scope for, well, what do other housing models look like?"