Is an SDA investment worth a look? For years my answer was no. Specialist Disability Accommodation (SDA) is funded through the NDIS, and when it began I looked at it and walked away.
What SDA is
SDA is housing for people with extreme functional impairment or very high support needs. A home is built to one of four design categories (improved liveability, fully accessible, robust, or high physical support) and enrolled with the NDIA by a provider registered with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission. The SDA funding is paid to the provider, the person who lives there pays a rent contribution, and their care is funded separately.
Why I stayed away for years
When SDA began, I saw homes built in the wrong places, on dark streets where carers come and go at night, and presented as a win with no downside. Some of those buyers lost badly. I told people to stay clear, and much of what I saw then I would still walk away from.
Looking again
In May 2024 I looked at SDA again.
Behind the bathroom walls sits reinforcement sheeting to 2.1 metres, as the SDA Design Standard requires, so if an occupational therapist calls for a handrail, it can go where it’s needed, with no stud to find. In the homes I walked through, it was plywood.
The MRD Benchmark
The rules only set a minimum. I hold SDA homes to my own bar, and I call it the MRD Benchmark: the questions a home has to answer plainly before I would think it worth owning.
- Where is it? Near transport, shops and health care, on a street a carer is happy to arrive at after dark.
- How is it built? Well above the minimum the rules set, with the extras an occupational therapist would look for, such as more room to move and a place for visiting family to sit in private.
- Who lives there, or will? A provider with participants ready to move in, not a hope of them.
- What is the lease? How long, with whom, and what happens when it ends.
- What does it cost to hold? Management, maintenance and insurance, and what happens to the income in a month with an empty room.
- Can you see it in writing? The enrolment, the lease and the figures, not only a brochure.
A home that cannot answer those plainly does not clear the MRD Benchmark, whatever it earns on paper.
See inside an SDA home
An MRD SDA home, designed for High Physical Support.
View the photosWatch the walkthrough
Facade 
Entry hall 
Living and dining 
Kitchen 
Participant room 1 
Participant room 2 
Ensuite 
Ensuite 2 
On-site overnight assistance room 
External space
Building your portfolio, or ready to get started
Retired, or within 10 years of it
What is SDA, really? The 13-minute film, from the ground up →
The bad with the good
- The owner’s income is lease income resting on SDA funding the NDIA pays to the provider, at prices the NDIA sets, and the rules can change.
- An empty room soon stops earning. The NDIS pays for a vacancy only in limited cases, for a shared home after a resident leaves and for a set time, so vacancy is the risk to watch most closely.
- It is a specialist property, so a sale can take longer, and the price leans on the home staying enrolled and occupied.
- There are more parties and more costs than with an ordinary rental: the provider, management and compliance.
- Against that: a home built for a real need, a long lease with a provider, and an income that rests on SDA funding rather than on the local rental market.
Building one, or buying one finished
You can build an SDA home or buy one already finished. Building means land, approvals, a build contract and enrolment, with months before any income, though the cost is yours to control. Buying a finished home means paying the market price, but you can see the enrolment, the lease and how long it has been occupied before you sign. Neither suits everyone. What suits you depends on your money, your time and how much risk you are willing to carry.
SDA and the 2026 tax changes
The law passed in June 2026 limits negative gearing from the 2027-28 income year for a home bought after 7.30pm AEST on 12 May 2026, new or established, and has no SDA exception. The Tax Reform No. 3 Bill 2026, passed by the House of Representatives on 29 October 2026 and not yet law, would exempt from the negative gearing limits a dwelling enrolled under NDIS rules as a specialist disability accommodation dwelling, from the 2027-28 income year. It may change before it passes. When it moves, I will update this page.
Before you say yes to SDA
If SDA has been put to you, it helps to talk it through before signing anything. The first conversation costs nothing.
Nicholas Lockhart
This page reflects the law as at 1 November 2026, and the bill as passed by the House of Representatives on 29 October 2026.
Sources: NDIS, Specialist disability accommodation explained (current as of 1 July 2026); NDIS, SDA pricing review (current as of 3 May 2026); NDIS, How to manage SDA vacancies (current as of 11 August 2026); NDIS, Specialist Disability Accommodation Design Standard (Edition 1.1, 25 October 2019); Treasurer, media release “Tax reform for a fairer tax system”, 14 October 2026.