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
Affordability shifts for home buyers as Australia’s median house price falls at its fastest rate on record
Sue Williams Domain (No paywall)House prices have slumped over the past quarter with the biggest falls on record in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Canberra, leaving prices across all the capitals around $53,000 lower than they were in March this year. The drops have been so dramatic, according to the latest Domain House Price Report, that house prices in three cities have now even been dragged below what they were this time last year, with Darwin 4.4 per cent down, Sydney 2.8 per cent lower and Melbourne 2 per cent under.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/affordability-shifts-for-home-buy…
# Australia, Housing market.What property slump? Developers get ready for next apartment boom
Simon Johanson The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Developers are gearing up for a flood of new migrants they think will underpin another apartment boom as rental vacancies dry up and inner-city rents surge. Reserve Bank internal research suggests property prices may plunge as much as 20 per cent following its latest series of interest rate rises, but some contrarian developers are banking on the opposite and buying large sites to build on.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/what-property-slump-de…
# Australia, Housing market, Landlords and agents.Ice on the walls: Some farmworkers are getting a rotten housing deal
Gerhard Uys (No paywall)From New Zealand ... Some farmworkers are getting a rotten deal when they sign a tenancy agreement. A dairy farm manager’s wife, who Stuff has agreed not to name for fear of reprisal, said her entire family became ill on a Taranaki farm as agriculture chemicals leaked into an open mouth well that supplied drinking water to the home they lived in as part of a tenancy agreement. The farm owner said he did not have money to address the issue, she said. ... Compliance with healthy home standards was being phased in over a number of years, but since July last year all private rental properties had to comply within 90 days of any new, or renewed tenancy. Landlords must also include a statement of their current level of compliance with the healthy homes standards in all new, or renewed tenancy agreement. All rental homes must comply with the healthy homes standards by July 1, 2024. (Stuff)
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/130280473/ice-on-the-wa…
# International, Rent, Health, Minimum habitability standards.More than half of NSW politicians own multiple properties
Tawar Razaghi Domain (No paywall)More than half of NSW MPs own two properties or more, parliamentary documents reveal, and one member owns 12. More than 60 per cent of those owners declared rental income on their investment properties in the 2021-2022 financial year. There are half a dozen politicians who own six properties or more. The figure compares to a general population where about one in five – or 21 per cent – of Australian households owned a residential property other than their home in 2019-20, Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows. ... While some experts have raised concerns about whether NSW parliament’s rate of property ownership is representative of the broader population, others say it is merely a symptom of a system that encourages high-income earners to invest in real estate. “In representative democracies, parliaments should be representative of the population. These figures reveal that NSW parliamentarians are far more likely to own multiple properties, to earn income from rentals, and they are far less likely to rent,” said Dr Richard Denniss, executive director of The Australian Institute. ... Denniss said tenant protections in Australia were particularly weak compared to other countries and many states, including NSW, continue to have no grounds evictions where landlords can kick tenants out for no reason. ... Greens MP Jenny Leong, who has introduced a bill in state parliament to end no-grounds evictions to help protect renters, challenged her parliamentary colleagues to vote for the piece of legislation. ″I would urge them to vote in favour of stopping people being booted out of their rental property for no reason,” Leong said.
https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/more-than-half-of-nsw-polit…
# NSW, Rent, Landlords and agents, No-grounds evictions, State Government.Housing accord could be a game changer for rental crisis
Everybody's Home (No paywall)A major housing package announced in the federal budget is a landmark step towards tackling Australia’s rental crisis, according to Everybody’s Home, the national campaign for real housing solutions. The National Housing Accord includes an additional $350 million to build 10,000 affordable homes over five years from 2024, on top of the $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund which will build 30,000 new social and affordable housing properties. State and territory governments have also committed to building 10,000 homes under the Accord. It also includes a target to build one million well-located and energy-efficient homes over the same period.
https://everybodyshome.com.au/housing-accord-could-be-a-game-cha…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Utilities water energy internet, Affordable housing, Federal Government, Housing market.'Aspirational' target of 1 million affordable rental homes unveiled in federal budget. Here's what the plan looks like
Peta Fuller ABC (No paywall)Look anywhere in Australia and you'll see a housing market under intense pressure. It makes the federal government's goal of a million homes under a new Housing Accord sound like welcome relief. But there's a lot in the detail here — so let's break down what's happening.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-25/federal-budget-million-af…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Utilities water energy internet, Affordable housing, Home ownership, Housing market, Older people.2022 budget: Jim Chalmers delivers national housing agreement to build 1m homes
Benta Kolovos The Guardian (No paywall)A national plan to build 1m new homes before the end of the decade will be announced in the federal budget as part of a historic agreement between governments, investors and the construction sector. The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, will announce the national housing accord during Tuesday’s budget, which will include the target of building 1m “well-located” and energy-efficient homes in five years, starting from 2024. The budget will include $350m in additional federal funding for the construction of 10,000 affordable homes over the five-year period, while state and territory governments have committed to building to 10,000. Chalmers said this was on top of the $10bn Housing Australia Future Fund, promised by Labor before the May election to build 30,000 new social and affordable housing properties in five years. “We want more Australians to know the security of decent housing and more Australians realising the aspiration of homeownership,” he said in a joint statement with the housing minister, Julie Collins.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/oct/25/australia…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Affordable housing, Federal Government, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market, Landlords and agents.A million extra homes won’t fix affordability headache
Peter Tulip The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The budget’s announcement of 1 million houses over the next five years will do very little to improve housing affordability. One million homes is about what we built in the past five years (974,732 dwellings, to be precise). Relative to the size of the economy, 1 million will, in fact, be a step down.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/a-million-extra-homes-won-t-fix-…
# Australia, Affordable housing, Housing affordability, Housing market, Planning and development.