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.
Our main email newsletter, Tenant News is sent once every two months. You can subscribe or update your subscription preferences for any of our email newsletters here.
See notes about the Digest and a list of other contributors here. Many thanks to those contributors for sharing links with us.
We love sharing the news and hope you find it informative! We're very happy to deliver it for free, but if you find it valuable, can you help cover the extra costs incurred by making a donation?
Archive
‘Deceptive’: Inquiry hears barrage of SA renter complaints
Rory Dowdell InDaily (No paywall)The state’s leading tenant advice and advocacy service has told a parliamentary committee it is under-resourced to deal with tenant complaints as calls to its hotline reach around 900 a month in SA. Independent tenant advice and advocacy service RentRight SA, operated by the community organisation SYC, received constant reports from tenants claiming they were being slugged with sudden rent increases of up to $250 a week, with large rent increases becoming more prevalent since the Covid outbreak in 2020.
https://www.indailysa.com.au/news/just-in/2026/10/07/misleading-…
# Australia, .The public housing answer Australia already knows
Andrew Brown Michael West Media (No paywall)While the public debate on housing shortages is as ill-informed as ever, one solution is not just obvious, but been well and truly tested. Andrew Brown with the second in a series. Ben Chifley started it, Robert Menzies kept it, in Vienna and Singapore, they never stopped. Public housing for working people is the most tested idea in housing policy, and Australia has done it before. After the war, one new home in seven in this country was public housing, built under a Labor prime minister and kept going by a Liberal one, and they went to fitters, clerks and returned servicemen, not charity cases.
https://michaelwest.com.au/the-public-housing-answer-australia-a…
# Australia, Public and community housing.Housing advocates say policy reform needed to prevent premature waitlist cancellations
James C Taylor ABC (No paywall)Colin Betts dons his Santa suit, collects his vibrant signs painted with positive messages, and walks barefoot out to the roadside. Accompanied by his faithful dog, Meri Rose, the 66-year-old brandishes the signs to the honks and waves of the passing traffic. Nicknamed the Barefoot Santa of Gympie, Mr Betts has been a public fixture in the regional Queensland town for the past decade.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-01/housing-waitlist-cancella…
# Australia, Public and community housing.Short-stay accommodation providers have mixed response to SA register plan
Aiden McNamara ABC (No paywall)Accountant Jenny Bickley makes about $45,000 in profit each year from guests hiring her dual-abode property in Mount Gambier. "The Airbnb model is way better than renting," she said. While Ms Bickley is one of many South Australians who run a short-stay accommodation business, it is not exactly clear how many there actually are. Last year, the state government wrapped up its inquiry into the sector amid nationwide concerns about the model affecting housing and rental affordability. Among the takeaways: SA lacked the data.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-05/registry-for-short-stay-a…
# Australia, .Singles struggle to afford housing as cost of living rises
Lottie Twyford ABC (No paywall)By her 70s, Louise Taylor had hoped her house would be more than a roof over her head; somewhere she could happily call home. But after "knockback after knockback" trying to find a rental on the private market five years ago, she has been forced to accept her small duplex, north of Brisbane, is all she can afford. "I was at desperate times and I went, 'You know what, I don't care, I just have to do it'," she says. "I was so grateful … then I'm looking around thinking, 'Where am I going to put my lounge room?'"
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-07/qld-cost-of-housing-for-s…
# Australia, .Tenants unable to pay higher rental prices, Domain data finds
Alex Turner-Cohen and Daniel Ziffer ABC (No paywall)Australia's rental market is beginning to lose steam despite rents remaining at record highs. It is the rapidly emerging disconnect that experts say could suggest tenants are being pushed to the brink as rents flatline and even fall across most of the major capitals. New data from Domain shows capital city house rents were unchanged at $700 a week over the September quarter, while unit rents rose by 1.5 per cent despite very low levels of rental properties available on the market.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-10-08/tenants-hit-breaking-poin…
# Australia, .Tight rental market not translating into rent rises due to affordability limit
ABC (No paywall)Despite severe rental shortages, landlords are struggling to increase rents due to tenants hitting their affordability limit.
New data shows rent is flatlining in most capital cities and has even fallen in a few in the past three months. Dr Nicola Powell, chief residential economist at Domain, explains the trends she's seeing between the rental market and prices. She believes the days of 'aggressive increases' in rents could be in the past as renters change their behaviours to cost-cut.
The quiet cul-de-sac at the centre of Sydney’s newest housing debate
Anthony Segaert The Sydney Morning Herald (Soft Paywall)There are many things that concern Louise Marchant and her son, Gary, about being forced out of their home after more than 30 years. Where will they go? How do they pack up the dozens of family photos and memories? And what do they do about the sheds overflowing with Christmas decorations in their backyard? Louise, 67, and Gary, 39, have worked with neighbours and friends to light up the quiet cul-de-sac of Indigo Way, Blacktown, in Sydney’s west, with a show-stopping display of lights and decorations ranging from snow-capped model towns to rooftop reindeer.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/the-quiet-cul-de-sac-at-the-…
# NSW, Public and community housing, Rent.