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
‘Sorry Yarra, you had your chance’: Social housing stoush exposes Labor-Greens tensions
Bianca Hall and Rachel Eddie The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The chance to build social housing next to Collingwood Town Hall is all but lost, after Housing Minister Richard Wynne said he would no longer work with the Greens-dominated local council on a housing project, in a fight that foreshadows the 2022 state election in his marginal seat.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/victoria/sorry-yarra-you-had-you…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Affordable housing, Local Government.No rent rise threat from Government housing policy, Westpac says
Rob Stock (No paywall)From New Zealand ... Westpac expects house price inflation to flatten over the rest of this year, with “moderate” falls over the next few years as longer-term interest rates rise. But the bank’s economists say renters can stop worrying about the prospect of rents rising significantly, despite threats from disgruntled landlords. Acting chief economist Michael Gordon said some of those landlords might be wise to take the opportunity to sell up to their tenants now. “The planned changes to the tax treatment of property investors are perhaps the most meaningful intervention into the housing market in decades,” Gordon said. (Stuff)
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/124796433/no-rent-rise-threat-f…
# International, Rent, Housing market, Landlords and agents, Tax.Damage bill from natural disasters to treble by 2061
Matt Wade and Nick O'Malley The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)More frequent and intense natural disasters fuelled by climate change are forecast to cost NSW between $15.8 and $17.2 billion a year by 2061 — more than three times the current damage bill from weather-related destruction.
https://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/damage-bill-fr…
# NSW, State Government.Two-speed rental market: Tenants offer up to $100 more a week to secure properties as moratoriums lift
Tawar Razaghi Domain (No paywall)Tenants in some capital cities are offering up to $100 a week in extra rent to secure sought-after rental properties, as eviction moratoriums end amid the country’s two-speed rental market. Some landlords are also taking the opportunity to raise their asking prices as crisis-era bans on rent hikes expire.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/two-speed-rental-market-tenants-o…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market, Landlords and agents.Rent and house prices in regional centres are soaring
ABC (No paywall)More and more people are moving to the regions from the big cities, and that, teamed with a lack of housing stock, has created difficult circumstances for a lot of young people. (ABC triplej HACK)
# Audio Australia, Rent, Home ownership, Housing market, Regional NSW.Sydney’s renovation road, where knockdown rebuilds are a dime a dozen
Michael Koziol The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)More than a dozen major renovations are either under way or in the pipeline on this millionaires’ row after five development applications for knockdown rebuilds were lodged between May and November last year, one of which has already been approved.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/sydney-s-renovation-road-whe…
# NSW, Housing market.Jettys folk shocked by order to raise homes to 3m
Ben Langford (No paywall)Residents of the Jettys by the Lake seniors "lifestyle village" at Windang, south of Sydney, have been told they need to raise their homes to three metres above sea level within five years - a cost which many would have no way to meet. And the 3m requirement - newly introduced by Wollongong City Council as a condition of alterations to Jettys' development consent - would mean many older residents couldn't get up all those stairs to their home.
https://www.northerndailyleader.com.au/story/7183061/shock-as-re…
# NSW, Land lease communities, Local Government, Older people.Over-promised and under-delivered’: Over a billion dollars in COVID-19 stimulus untouched
Angus Thompson The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Only two per cent of money promised to help women return to the workforce has so far been spent amid revelations more than $1.4 billion in grants, waivers and loans promised by the NSW government to help people struggling through the pandemic remain untouched. ... A $440 million package designed to flow onto rental relief for commercial and residential tenants has seen just $95 million spent, with the vast majority of that going to the commercial sector. The NSW Tenants’ Union said the government should spend the money on direct financial assistance or low-interest loan schemes to help tenants pay off rental arrears.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/over-promised-and-under-deli…
# Must read, TUNSW in the media NSW, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19.