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
Melbourne City council urges young buyers to snap up a bargain
Noel Towell and Vanessa Di Natale The Age (Paywall)The City of Melbourne is planning an ambitious pitch to use the CBD’s struggling property market to tempt more young people to make their homes there. ... the council believes the corresponding plunge in property prices - and state government tax breaks worth tens of thousands of dollars to buyers - can be leveraged in its efforts to breathe life back into the precincts.
https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-city-counc…
# Australia, Home ownership, Human rights, Tax.North Queensland's property market booming as interstate buyers take advantage of lower prices
Zilla Gordon and Adam Stephen ABC (No paywall)Chelsea Stevens has 100 buyers ready to find their next home, but there are no houses for them to buy. The real estate agent in Townsville, North Queensland, said some were so desperate to secure a property, they were making an offer despite not setting foot in the state.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-16/interstate-buyers-causing…
# Australia, Housing market.4 Lessons From Berlin Organizers’ Campaign to Re-Nationalize 250,000 Apartments
Oksana Mironova (No paywall)From the United States ... At the end of September, Berliners went to the polls to vote for a new city and federal government. Their ballots included a controversial measure, Deutsche Wohnen Enteignen (Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen), calling for the socialization of the city’s largest landlords, who control about 10 percent (or 240,000 units) of the city’s housing stock. In a non-binding referendum, voters were asked if the city government should purchase the portfolios of landlords who own 3,000 or more apartments in Berlin. While the two most popular parties, the Social Democrats and the Greens, received 21.4 percent and 18.9 percent of the vote, respectively, most voters–56 percent–voted in favor of the referendum. Berliners are in much greater agreement over socialization than what the city’s next government should look like. ... Here’s what U.S. [and Australian] activists can learn from the socialization campaign. (Next City)
https://nextcity.org/urbanist-news/entry/4-lessons-from-berlin-o…
# Must read International, Public and community housing, Rent, Campaigns and law reform, Housing market.Why renting is a health risk
ABC (No paywall)Some health risks are obvious, like smoking, or eating too much sugar. But what about renting? As many as a million Australians live in housing that harms their health, with renters the worst off. So what's the health cost of having so much substandard housing? And how do you even begin to fix a problem like that? Featured: Alice, Sydney tenant Professor Rebecca Bentley, Director of the Centre of Research Excellence in Healthy Housing, National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Dr Kim Loo, General Practitioner. (The Signal) You might also check out this article from 'The Conversation' from 26 October 2020. Go to: [https://theconversation.com/mould-and-damp-health-costs-are-about-3-times-those-of-sugary-drinks-we-need-a-healthy-housing-agenda-147743]
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/the-signal/heallthy-housin…
# Audio Australia, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Health, Minimum habitability standards.Poor housing harms health of 20% of renters in England, says Shelter
Robert Booth and Patrick Butler The Guardian (No paywall)Poor housing is harming the health of one in five renters in England, with mould, damp and cold the main triggers of sickness, a major survey by the housing charity Shelter has revealed. Approximately 1.9m households could be suffering physical and mental problems as a result of poor housing conditions as well as uncertainty caused by struggles to pay the rent and repeated evictions, polling of over 3,000 private renters suggests. A quarter of all renters said they were affected by damp and mould and by being unable to heat their homes. They were three times more likely to say housing was harming their health than those without the problems. The study also detailed how almost one in four renters said their housing situation had left them feeling “stressed and anxious” since the start of the pandemic.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/oct/13/poor-housing-har…
# International, Eviction, Rent, Utilities water energy internet, Coronavirus COVID-19, Health, Mould.Black mould, termites and no electricity or hot water: Inside the Aboriginal housing divide
Ella Archibald-Binge ABC (No paywall)Annabelle Dargin knows what it's like to endure hardship. The Wiradjuri woman grew up during an era of racial segregation, when discriminative laws governed the lives of Aboriginal people and forced them to live in tin huts on missions or reserves on the outskirts of towns. Much has changed since then, but the 78-year-old is still living in what she describes as "neglected" housing. Most rooms are without electricity, cables are exposed and, for nine months, the great-grandmother washed out of a bucket due to a lack of hot water. "It's ridiculous," she said. "Give me the mission any day."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-13/condobolin-aboriginal-ten…
# Video NSW, Aboriginal renters, Public and community housing, Repairs, Utilities water energy internet, Housing market, Mould.Heritage-listed Victorian terraces in historic The Rocks precinct sell for $36.25m
Tawar Razaghi Domain (No paywall)The NSW government has sold off a set of heritage-listed Victorian terraces in historic The Rocks for $36.25 million under a 99-year leasehold of the land. Also, check out the same story in 'The Urban Developer' at: [https://www.theurbandeveloper.com/articles/longs-lane-the-rocks-sold-assembly-nashcap]
https://www.domain.com.au/news/heritage-listed-victorian-terrace…
# NSW, Public and community housing, Heritage listings, Housing market, State Government.Housing played ‘significant role’ in higher COVID-19 rates among Black and minority ethnic people, says official report
Lucie Heath Inside Housing (Paywall)From the United Kingdom ... [The report entitled] 'Coronavirus: lessons learned to date' ... said the death rates among people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities was “unacceptably high” and pointed to housing, working conditions and “possible biological factors” as things that contributed to “unequal outcomes”. The wide-ranging 145-page report was published today by the Health and Social Care Committee and lays out the mistakes made and the successes of the government’s response to COVID-19 during the first year and a half of the pandemic. “Increased exposure to COVID-19 as a result of people’s housing and working conditions played a significant role” in the higher death rates amongst BAME people,” it said.
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/news/housing-played-signifi…
# International, Coronavirus COVID-19, Health, Housing market, Race and ethnicity.