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
Australians are facing the highest growth in rent prices since GFC
Soofia Tariq The Guardian (No paywall)Rent has climbed at its fastest rate in more than a decade, with some weekly payments up 10%, new data shows. Although the CoreLogic national rent index, released on Monday, points to some relief in the previous quarter – 3.41% in the June quarter, down from 3.55% over the March quarter and 3.73% a year earlier – nationally rental rates rose by 6.6% in the past 12 months, the highest annual growth since the global financial crisis in 2009. The median rent of houses and units jumped to $476 a week in June, a 6.6% increase compared with the same time last year. Regional rents reported the largest annual increase on record, with the median figure up 11.3% to $441, due largely to sea changers moving during the pandemic.
https://www.theguardian.com/global/2021/jul/19/australians-are-f…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market, Regional NSW.Angle Vale residents call for urgent infrastructure upgrades as housing boom hits
Isabel Dayman ABC (No paywall)A former rural township north of Adelaide is becoming a bustling hub, and residents say the infrastructure is failing to keep up. In Angle Vale, 40 kilometres north of Adelaide, 14 developers are working on new housing projects, and a brand-new superschool with capacity for 1,500 students is due to open at the start of next year. But locals say the most basic infrastructure is not keeping up — and with so many more people expected to move into the area, some fear the situation will only get worse.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-19/angle-vale-residents-want…
# Australia, Housing market, Planning and development.The Perth suburbs where landlords make hay while tenants cop 16 per cent rent rise
Daile Cross The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Perth landlords are doing well out of their property investments compared to owners across other capital cities, with an average gross house yield at 4.2 per cent compared to an average of 3.12 per cent. Unit owners are doing even better, with their gross yields at 5.34 per cent against a national average of 3.62 per cent.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/western-australia/armadale-landl…
# Australia, Housing market, Landlords and agents.House with no toilet sells for $2m as New Zealand property market soars
Eva Corbett The Guardian (No paywall)From New Zealand ... A decaying three-bedroom house with no toilet or bathroom, missing walls and an overgrown garden has sold in New Zealand for more than $2m (£1m), in the latest example of runaway property markets around the world.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/15/house-with-no-toil…
# International, Housing market.Perth developer denies trying to ‘bypass’ planning process in bid to expand prime beach project
Peter de Kruijff The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Perth developer Adrian Fini has defended his company after accusations he is trying to “bypass” local government planning laws to build a new beachside development on a stunning piece of West Australian coastline near Yallingup.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/western-australia/perth-develope…
# Australia, Planning and development, Short-term holiday letting.Evicted without warning, again: As lockouts resume, tenants are left scrambling for homes
(No paywall)The Philadelphia Municipal Court resumed evictions this July, and some tenants could be locked out after not hearing from the court in months. Since March 2020, only a handful of tenants have been locked out of their homes in Philadelphia due to moratoriums spurred by the pandemic. That changed on July 1, when the Philadelphia Municipal Court gave a green light to the landlord-tenant officers, the private company that handles the final steps of the eviction process, to execute evictions. (The Inquirer)
https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/editorials/eviction-philadelphi…
# International, Eviction, Coronavirus COVID-19.NSW Government introduces a 60-day freeze on evictions
(No paywall)The New South Wales Government has announced a 60-day moratorium on evictions to support the state as it battles through extended COVID-19 lockdowns. (rent.com.au)
# Must read NSW, Eviction, Privacy and access, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19.Rental spike
(Paywall)Rental prices have jumped up in the last 12 months; increases not seen in more than a decade. (Prime 7 Ballarat)
# Australia, Rent, Housing market.