Housing News Digest
Housing News Digest
The Tenants' Union Housing News Digest compiles our pick of items from all the latest tenancy and housing media, sent once per week, on Thursdays.
Below is the Digest archive from November 2020 onwards. From time to time you will find additional items in the archive that did not make it into the weekly Digest email. Earlier archives are here, where you can also find additional digests by other organisations.
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Archive
'Little to no evidence' interest rate hikes are causing rent rises, no quick fix for housing crisis, RBA says
Daniel Jeffrey 9 News (No paywall)Surging interest rates have not caused rental prices around the country to skyrocket to record highs, according to the Reserve Bank of Australia. Thirteen increases have pushed the cash rate up from 0.1 to 4.35 per cent in the last two years, which has been cited as a factor in weekly rents growing at a rapid pace. However, RBA assistant governor Sarah Hunter has said there is no evidence to suggest landlords are directly passing on the rate hikes to their tenants, and that any link between rising rates and rents is a case of correlation rather than causation.
https://www.9news.com.au/finance/housing-crisis-australia-intere…
# Hot topic Australia, .Australia's housing crisis in 10 graphs, from the federal budget
Gareth Hutchens ABC (No paywall)The Albanese government knows Australia has a housing problem. It says the country is suffering from “historic underinvestment” in housing that's created a significant supply shortage. In its 2024-25 budget, it has dedicated an entire chapter to the crisis — a sign of how seriously the issue is considered. "Australia's housing system has been unable to build enough new housing stock to keep up with the needs of our population," it warns. "This has caused a growing supply deficit, resulting in worsening affordability for both renters and first-home buyers." In the special housing chapter, Treasury officials have illustrated the problem with more than 20 graphs. Here are 10 of the most illuminating ones.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-15/federal-budget-housing-cr…
# Hot topic Australia, Rent.Campers in central Victoria face eviction from own land by Mount Alexander Shire Council, despite rent crisis
Fiona Parker and Emma D'Agostino ABC (No paywall)Single mother Beck Meyers has a place to live, on land she owns, and she is quite comfortable and happy living there. But her home is a camp-style set-up that doesn't adhere to council regulations, so she, her two primary school-aged children, and her friend Nathaniel Muller, who co-owns the land with her, have been ordered to pack up and leave by the end of the week. Ms Meyers and her children have been living at the bush block at Campbells Creek, near Castlemaine, since September, when the lease on their rental property ended and they could not afford anywhere else. Mr Muller has lived at the site for longer. Now, they fear they will end up homeless. "It's absolutely bureaucracy gone mad," Ms Meyers said.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-15/campbells-creek-property-…
# Must read Australia, Eviction, Rent, Security and safety.VIDEO: Renter says budget fails to address housing crisis
ABC News Breakfast ABC (No paywall)Adelaide renter Jo Newbury has been struggling with rising rent and says the budget has failed to adequately help the housing crisis. "I think I speak for a lot of people when I say we're a little bit disappointed, it was a bit of an out of touch response from the Treasurer in regards to what the renting crisis actually looks like for low-income earners."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-15/this-wasnt-the-early-30s-…
# Hot topic, Audio, Video Australia, .Cost of Living Secrets: Renting
Ricardo Goncalves, Peggy Giakoumelos SBS (No paywall)Rents have reached a record high in Australia as demand outstrips supply in some areas, elevating cost of living pressures for tenants. So what can be done about it?
In this episode of Cost of Living Secrets with Ricardo Gonçalves and Peggy Giakoumelos we speak with Emma Power Associate Professor in Geography and Urban Studies from Western Sydney University who shares her tips on: How to re-negotiate a rental increase; how to save money on energy bills while renting; what legal protections are in place for renters; the joys and pitfalls of share housing; and where to get help if you're struggling financially.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/podcast-episode/cost-of-living-secre…
# Audio Australia, Rent.Single parents and domestic violence victim-survivors squeezed out of the tight rental market
Libby Hogan ABC (No paywall)When Megan's ex-husband locked her and her children out of their house, the mother-of-two suddenly had no home and no source of income. She said her family had been working and living on the farm in rural Victoria for more than a decade, until her ex-husband became increasingly abusive because of financial pressures. All of a sudden homeless, Megan and her children walked for two hours to reach the nearest police station with nothing but the clothes on their backs. "I just focused on getting the police officer's help … to go back to the house so we could get my son's school uniforms and books," Megan, who is using a pseudonym in this story to protect her identity, said. "And I needed to get my cancer medication as I was getting my nutrients through a feed tube."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-22/rise-in-single-mothers-th…
# Must read Australia, Domestic violence, Rent, Security and safety.‘I just can’t move again’: the Melbourne public housing residents fighting to save their community
Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen The Guardian (No paywall)"If I dwell on what this estate will be, I get miserable and anxious,” says Will Gwynne in one scene of Things Will Be Different. The new documentary captures the Walker Street public housing estate in Melbourne’s inner-city Northcote, where Gwynne lived for five years before it was knocked down to make way for a new mixed development, destroying his home and community. Directed by the Melbourne film-maker Lucie McMahon, Things Will Be Different follows the dying days of Walker Street as Gwynne, a housing activist, and his neighbour Najat, a Moroccan mother of four, prepare for their forced relocation. “The first time I saw the completed film, I just collapsed,” Gwynne tells Guardian Australia. “I was devastated when they said they were going to knock it down. I thought, ‘I just can’t move again.’”
https://www.theguardian.com/film/article/2024/may/13/things-will…
# Hot topic Australia, Eviction, Public and community housing, Rent.‘Have been more than fair’: Anthony Albanese responds to tenant’s eviction plea
Samantha Maiden news.com.au (No paywall)Anthony Albanese has broken his silence on his decision to serve an eviction notice to a longstanding tenant, revealing the reason for kicking the man out is all about his “changing circumstances” and his wedding to partner Jodi Haydon. But he’s accused tenant Jim Flanagan, 45, of failing to engage with the real estate agent about resolving the matter after he went public with his plea for mercy. The Prime Minister, who was grilled on the dispute during a breakfast radio interview, also claimed he was giving him a cut price deal that was “half” the going rate for the property.
https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/news/anthony-albaneses-…
# Hot topic NSW, Eviction, Rent.