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.
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
Plan to ban dark roofs abandoned as NSW government walks back sustainability measures
Elias Visontay The Guardian (No paywall)The New South Wales government has abandoned its plan to ban dark roofs – aimed at reducing temperatures and energy costs for new homes – as the state’s new planning minister walks back ambitious sustainability measures announced by his predecessor. Former planning minister Rob Stokes previously announced he would be tasking the Department of Planning and Environment with implementing a requirement for lighter-coloured roofs in all new homes in the state, and that the policy feature would help NSW achieve its goal of net zero emissions by 2050. “This would have an enormous impact on the urban heat island effect in our city,” Stokes told a forum run by urban thinktank Committee for Sydney in November. ... aul Scully, the NSW Labor opposition planning spokesperson, said “the NSW government needs to come clean with precisely which planning policies it remains committed to and how scrapping measures aimed at addressing climate change in the built environment will achieve their net zero by 2050 target”. “Another week, another component of the NSW government’s net zero commitment appears to have fallen by the way side,” Scully said.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/apr/09/plan-to-b…
# NSW, Climate change, Housing market, Minimum habitability standards, Planning and development.Rate rise could wipe 15 per cent from home prices: RBA
Shane Wright The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)A 2 percentage point lift in interest rates could knock 15 per cent off the value of Australian homes, the Reserve Bank has warned while telling people who have taken out huge mortgages over recent years to start bracing for an increase in their repayments. The RBA said people who took out fixed-rate mortgages on record low interest rates during the COVID-19 recession faced potentially “large shocks” as they rolled over their loans into an environment with much higher rates.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/rate-rise-could-wipe-15-…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.'Corruption, manipulation, deceit’ found in WA departmen
Judy Skatssoon (No paywall)A project manager in the WA state government took a 10 per cent cut of every contract awarded to a mate, a corruption investigation has found. The investigation uncovered what the state’s corruption watchdog describes as a ‘web of corruption, manipulation and deceit’ in WA’s former housing department. The Corruption and Crime Commission report, Misconduct in the Department of Communities relating to country building projects , details how a senior project manager with the then housing department accepted kickbacks from two men who, with his help, won lucrative contracts.
https://www.governmentnews.com.au/corruption-manipulation-deceit…
# Australia, Public and community housing.Refugees stuck in hotel rooms as Perth's rental crisis continues
Alicia Bridges ABC (No paywall)Some refugee families have been living in Perth hotels for more than six weeks as they struggle to find a home in an extremely competitive rental market, support workers say. The ABC understands about 40 families, mostly from Afghanistan, are living in hotel rooms in the city. A shortage of housing, inflated rental prices, prejudice among landlords and a lack of rental history are among the disadvantages faced by refugees seeking a place to call home, according to support workers. "There's an incredible amount of mental distress when people don't have safe, secure housing for themselves and for their families," Centre for Asylum Seekers, Refugees and Detainees acting general manager Esther Deng said. "If you don't have stable and secure housing – one of the basic needs that all of us in the community seek and require for our day-to-day existence – it is really hard to feel that you can settle in."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-07/refugees-stuck-in-hotel-r…
# Australia, Rent, Housing affordability, Housing market, Race and ethnicity.Airbnb’s Ukraine moment is a reminder of what the sharing economy can be
Daiane Scaraboto and Bernardo Figeiredo The Conversation (No paywall)As desirable vacation destinations go, war-torn Ukraine must surely rate low. But in the first month of Russia’s invasion, Airbnb bookings in Ukraine boomed, as people around the world used the accommodation platform to channel more than US$15 million in donations to the country. As with other forms of direct donation, using Airbnb to channel aid to Ukraine has been problematic. The company was relatively quick to waive the 20% commission it usually charges on transactions. But stopping scammers from setting up fake accounts to collect money from well-meaning donors has proven more difficult. t’s a story that illustrates both the potential and limitations of the so-called sharing economy.
https://theconversation.com/airbnbs-ukraine-moment-is-a-reminder…
# International, Short-term holiday letting.Australia's rental crisis
ABC (No paywall)Young people are struggling to find affordable rentals across the country. Finding a place to rent is a massive struggle right now. Only one per cent of rental properties across Australia are actually available, and tenants who saw some rent relief during the pandemic are now facing huge price hikes as things get back to normal. (tripleJ HACK)
# TUNSW in the media, Audio Australia, Rent, Homelessness, Housing affordability.How much do landlords really need to know about their tenants?
Jimmy Thomson (Paywall)How much do you want or – indeed – need to know about the prospective tenants of your property? Previous tenancies? Bankruptcies? Criminal records? How about them knowing their legal rights and whether they’ve asserted them, especially in strata schemes? The issues have been raised as credit check and data analysis company Equifax tries to wean property rental managers away from “manual” checks of references, employment and previous tenancies, saying they waste time and resources. Instead, it says, its National Tenancy Database can provide instant background screening on prospective tenants based on a deep dive of personal data similar to processes it uses for credit checks. ... Unsurprisingly, tenants’ advocates are less than impressed. Leo Patterson Ross, CEO of Tenants’ Union of NSW, says renters already have to provide too much information, the security of which can, generally speaking, be hit and miss. [He continues]: “The application process is effectively unregulated [and] there are no governing guidelines or principles given in the Residential Tenancies Act. The current non-transparent application process leaves many renters frustrated and feeling like they have had to turn over an excessive amount of personal information without really knowing how it will be used. This is especially so for the digital application processes." (Australian Financial Review)
https://www.afr.com/wealth/personal-finance/how-much-do-landlord…
# TUNSW in the media Australia, Privacy and access, Rent, Landlords and agents.Indigenous sisters evicted from rental property following father's death
Kearyn Cox SBS (No paywall)Three vulnerable Noongar-Yamatji sisters have been left without a guardian or a place to live after a private real estate company evicted them from their property in Perth last week. The girls were left in a vacancy limbo when their father and sole guardian, Aubrey Roe, passed away a week after his first Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine in October last year. (NITV)
https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/article/2022/04/04/indigenous-sister…
# Australia, Aboriginal renters, Eviction, Homelessness.