No pressure, but you need to own a house by this age. Or else you'll "miss the boat".

Turns out Australians hoping to enter the property market aren’t just battling soaring house prices, they’re also racing against a ticking clock.

And if you haven’t got your foot in the door of your own place by the age of 45, you’ve probably “missed the boat”, a leading expert has warned.

You see it’s not just the ever-inflating bubble that’s against you, as your risk of sickness and unemployment increases with age, so do the difficulties you’ll face convincing a bank to help you out.

“If they can’t accumulate the savings by 45, they’re not that likely to ever because the housing is that much more expensive, and whether a bank will lend to them is a separate issue,” Swinburne University’s Dr Andrea Sharam, who authored a new report on the subject, told The New Daily.

The report looked at the wealth of men and women aged 40 to 65 as well as recent retirees.

The aim being, to see which households and individuals would be in the best position financially after retiring.

"It’s just almost too late for people at 45 if they're not already purchasing their house and got that mortgage down a bit," Dr Sharam said, adding that lone person and couple-only renters over that age tended to have a shortage of funds.

Marriages breaking down tended to have a negative impact on both parties money-wise, while single mothers with young children were "particularly vulnerable", the report found.

Add to that the fact that, on average, Australian women retire with about half as much superannuation as men, along with rising rents and it's a bit of a worry.

So what do the researchers recommend?

More investment in low-cost social housing and other affordable housing measures for one, along with a re-examination of rental rights, which most would agree is long overdue.