Buying a home is a great dream for many young Australians, and will probably stay that way at least in the immediate future. For those of us who do take the plunge into debt, we are faced with a very ugly word repeatedly: TAX.

For a first home buyer or even a young player who might not be as familiar with the "T" word as our parents are, it can be a very disheartening experience to allocate such a large chunk of your guarded little nest egg to your lender and the government.

Pulling the deposit together is a big enough task without factoring in all the pricey and, in some cases, seemingly unnecessary extras (could someone please justify to me why I need to pay a registration tax for my mortgage? Surely having the mortgage in the first place is enough of a commitment, without being slapped in the face with another monetary request?). Don't even get me started on stamp duty....

Beware the other naughty word: FEE. This may not sound as harsh as TAX but it sure means the same thing: more money. As hard as you try to assure yourself that all of the little (sometimes hidden) fees and charges, that do add up to be quite a lot of money in the end, are entirely worth it because it's one step closer to being a home owner, it really is downright unfair.

If people really want to understand why housing affordability is such a scary problem in this country, we need to look beyond just the pricing issue. It's not as simple as believing that if house prices and interest rates start to fall, home buyers will come out of the woodwork.

A prospective buyer who has been there before or has done their homework will know that they will need a fair chunk of cash set aside purely to spend on everything but the property itself - solicitors fees, building, strata and pest inspection fees, fees to establish your home loan, fees to allow the government to approve the purchase of the darn property in the first place, and the list goes on. For those first home buyers who think the first home buyers' grant will get you places, let me break it to you gently....it will be gone in the blink of an eye.

We need to look at the housing affordability crisis from a holistic point of view. To mandate that vendors and landlords ask for realistic selling or rental prices is not enough. Financial institutions and all levels of government need to get in on the act and look at what they can do to help out.

I said I wouldn't go there but I have to. Stamp Duty. What the hell is this tax for anyway? Such a hefty sum of money is enough to put anyone off who operates on even the most flexible budget.  I can't see any good reason for it not to be abolished entirely, and if it must stay, revising the rate at which it's calculated has got to be worth a try.  The introduction of concessions, differing from state to state, for first home buyers, investors and so forth is a good start, but fails to help the bulk of Australians who end up qualifying for nothing.

Leading banks and lenders should be prepared to reward customer loyalty as a first and foremost priority. Charging a fee for every time someone picks up a pen or presses the print button is rather insulting. If we want to encourage more people to enter the market, there needs to be some incentive for them to do so. Customers want to feel as though lenders will compete for and value their business, rather than operate on the "they're all the same" mentality.

That all being said, there is nothing like having a roof over your head - your roof - even though you might only own one tile on it for a number of years. It should be a very serious goal in this country to have as many Australians as possible embrace the idea and, more importantly, realise the dream of purchasing their own home. Though until the right people come to the party, a realistic and plausible solution is about as likely as introducing an appropriate strategy for paid maternity leave....but that's another blog!

Alison Gordon is Manager, Client Services, with Global Access Partners [1].