With Albury’s rental market among the tightest in the state, new on-site accommodation for healthcare workers at Albury Hospital is moving from plan to build – a step local leaders say is critical to recruiting and keeping staff on the border. Albury’s vacancy rate sat around 1.0% in June 2025, well below the 3% level considered “healthy”, underscoring the need for dedicated worker housing.
Zauner Construction has been appointed to deliver the $9.5m Key Health Worker Accommodation on the Albury campus. The fully furnished, self-contained units will be built off-site then installed near the Regional Cancer Centre to minimise disruption. Work is slated to finish by mid-2026. Funding comprises $7.5m from the Albanese government under the Albury Wodonga Regional Projects program and $2m from the Minns government’s Key Health Worker Accommodation program.
Albury Wodonga Health says the project addresses a practical barrier to attracting staff to Australia’s only cross-border public health service. The service covers north-east Victoria and the NSW Riverina and continues to expand as the region grows.
A test of whether housing can help fix rural workforce gaps
The NSW government has leaned into key worker housing as a workforce tool, lifting total investment for rural health worker accommodation by $200.1m in the 2024–25 budget. Program documents stress the aim is modern, safe units on hospital grounds that help regions attract and retain clinicians.
Comparable builds are already opening across the state. In Cooma, 12 units on the hospital site were completed in April, while Broken Hill has 20 new units ready for staff. Both are part of the NSW government’s $45.3m package rolling out across several rural centres. Early feedback from the program cites West Wyalong as an example of the housing helping to draw staff.
The stakes are high. National data show rural and remote Australians have poorer access to care and worse health outcomes than city residents, and workforce shortages are a persistent pressure point.
Part of a larger hospital overhaul
The accommodation dovetails with the $558m redevelopment of Albury Wodonga Regional Hospital, which will consolidate more services on one campus, add beds and expand critical care capacity. Early works for the new Northeast Building are under way with a separate contractor, signalling the broader project is gathering pace.
Minister for Regional Development and Local Government, Kristy McBain MP, said securing on-site housing was about making the wider hospital investment work for patients. NSW Minister for Regional Health, Ryan Park, called accommodation a practical way to remove barriers for clinicians considering a move to the regions. Albury Wodonga Health chief executive Bill Appleby described the units as a “strategic enabler” for recruitment and retention.
For a border community served by a bi-state health service, the measure is more than bricks and mortar – it is a live test of whether fit-for-purpose housing can tilt the balance on regional staffing and speed up the delivery of care closer to home.
Main image: Key worker accommodation arrives in West Wyalong. Courtesy: The Griffith Pheonix
