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NEWTAAS Annual Report 2022

NEWTAAS Advocates
Spiralling rents threaten many tenants with homelessness if they lose their homes. Many tenants are being evicted for no reason (no grounds terminations). NEWTAAS Tenant Advocates assess a client's risk of homelessness based on income and the tenant's experience in sourcing a new home. In 2021-2022 tenants and risk of homelessness rose by more than 80%. The threat of homelessness means many are forced to keep quiet about serious maintenance issues. In the New England, North West, Western and Far West areas of NSW, NEWTAAS works to increase access to the legal system for the most disadvantaged people in the communities we serve...
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The insecurity and uncertainty of renting: 'A constant exercise in weighing up options.'

Home, two feet at a door mat that reads 'home' leading in to a house
At the recent Briefing on Healthy Homes for Renters held at NSW Parliament on 13 October 2022, Sarah* shared her experience renting her home. Though a lawyer and academic researcher, Sarah explained that as a renter she does not feel confident asserting her rights to a healthy home.
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Healthy Homes for Renters at NSW Parliament

Group photo at briefing Healthy Homes for Renters
Yesterday the Tenants' Union of NSW alongside Better Renting and Sweltering Cities provided a briefing on Healthy Homes for Renters to a diverse, cross section of Members of the NSW Parliament. The briefing focused on the need for energy efficiency standards in rental  homes and renters’ current experience of unhealthy homes in NSW.
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Who is using the Tribunal and why?

Heat map re evictions
We are always trying to better understand what is happening for NSW renters. We want to make sure we can identify the problems and pressures renters are experiencing, as well as whether the policies and laws in place to support them are working. In this blog we use data from NCAT about the lodgements of their tenancy and social housing lists over the past financial year, that is July 2021 - June 2022 and ask who is taking action, and about what?
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Evicted! Comedy about renting in Sydney

Group of housemates
Evicted! is a new comedy about renting in Sydney. The film won the audience award for best feature at the 2022 Sydney Film Festival. It follows a ragtag bunch of millennial housemates who get evicted and have to navigate the hellish rental market in search of a new place to call home, all on top of job hunting, side hustling and dating.
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Outasite - land lease community magazine

Outasite logo
The Tenants' Union has just published issue 8 of Outasite – our annual printed publication for land lease communities! It has been delivered to mailboxes in communities all over NSW.
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Devastating impact of the floods in the Tweed Chinderah Area

Flooded land lease community
Residential land lease communities in the Northern Rivers region of NSW were severely impacted by floods in early 2022. Many land lease communities are located on low lying, flood-prone land which means that flooding events like the one earlier this year can cause severe destruction and devastation to the community.
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Fixed method site fee increases becoming the trend

Charles
The Tenants’ Union have noticed a trend towards operators preferring to use the fixed method for site fee increases. This trend has many implications for home owners and will ultimately lead to higher site fee increases, well above actual costs incurred in operating and maintaining residential land lease communities by the operator.
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Fair Market Value – A win in one case and an anomaly uncovered in another

the N Cat
An anomaly has been exposed in the safeguards for fair market value when setting site fees in new site agreements, when the operator owns the home that is being sold.
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The non-compliant mediation form

Outasite logo
An NCAT matter began as a collective application disputing a site fee increase at Milton Valley Holiday Park. At formal hearing the Member decided the Tribunal did not have jurisdiction on a collective application challenging a site fee as excessive because the mediation application was not accompanied by a schedule of at least 25% of home owners. The Fair Trading compulsory mediation application form doesn’t have a place for this schedule and does not provide any information that this is a requirement.
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