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
‘Only if the return stacks up’: Super funds will demand sweeteners to back Labor housing plan
Simone Fox Koob The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The federal government will have to put “something in the tin” to make social and affordable housing an attractive investment for superannuation funds, with experts warning of a raft of complications in making its new housing accord a success. Last month the federal government released the National Housing Accord, a key plank of this year’s budget, which will explore ways to facilitate superannuation and institutional capital investment in social and affordable housing. It aims to build 1 million new homes over five years from 2024. The super industry broadly welcomed the accord, but funds are expected to be cautious given laws require that members’ financial interests come first in investment decisions. Super funds have historically shied away from residential housing due to low returns. Grattan Institute economic policy program director Brendan Coates said super funds could be attracted to the idea of acquiring another asset class to which they can allocate some of the more than $3 trillion of superannuation savings they manage, but “they’re only going to do it if the return stacks up, and that means government would have to subsidise it”.
https://www.smh.com.au/money/super-and-retirement/only-if-the-re…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Affordable housing, Federal Government, Housing market, Landlords and agents.As housing prices surge, rent control is back on the ballot
Janie Har and Michael Casey (No paywall)From the United States ... Liberty McCoy was out Saturday urging voters to pass a Nov. 8 ballot measure to limit rent increases in Pasadena because she’s afraid she’ll be priced out of the city where she grew up and where her aging parents live. The librarian and her husband, a freelance consultant, received notice of a $100 monthly rent increase last year and another for $150 this year, bringing the rent on their home outside Los Angeles to $2,350 a month. They can absorb the increases for now — but not forever. ... With rental prices skyrocketing and affordable housing in short supply, inflation-weary tenants in cities and counties across the country are turning to the ballot box for relief. Supporters say rent control policies on the Nov. 8 ballot are the best short-term option to dampen rising rents and ensure vulnerable residents remain housed. (AP News)
https://apnews.com/article/2022-midterm-elections-florida-san-fr…
# International, Rent, Campaigns and law reform, History, Housing market.State regulators considering action over real estate websites pressuring rental applicants
Bension Siebert ABC (No paywall)Regulators in four states are considering taking action after an ABC investigation into real estate websites that pressure rental applicants to pay for their own background checks. The ABC confirmed at least 160 real estate agencies have used the 2Apply platform to process applications for more than 1,700 properties across every Australian capital city and most major regional centres. 2Apply urges rental applicants to "stand out from the pack" by paying for their own background checks. Tenants can decline to pay, but their rating is capped at four out of five stars, and they must tick a box that says: "No thanks, I don't want to verify my identity." ... University of New South Wales tenancy law expert Chris Martin said receiving payment from prospective tenants as part of rental applications could be illegal in several jurisdictions. "There's a good argument, I think, that that's unlawful under the rules in Tasmania, New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia," Dr Martin said. ... Now, government regulators in each of those states have confirmed they are examining the issue. ... The ABC also understands NSW Fair Trading is reviewing the issue.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-04/regulators-examining-rent…
# Australia, Privacy and access, Landlords and agents.Why do we have such low rental vacancy? It doesn’t mean a shortage of houses
Cameron Murray The Guardian (No paywall)When the number of rental advertisements falls we often hear that rental “vacancy” is low, indicating a “shortage” of housing. But this story confuses a number of concepts. In this piece, I do two things: First, I show how rental vacancy in the housing market is analogous to the unemployment rate in labour markets. Second, I explain how low rental vacancy is a symptom of the rental price adjustment process itself, not an independent force acting on prices (ie rental price change and vacancy are co-determined by the same process).
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/nov/05/why-do-we-…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market.JP Morgan Wants to Make Tenant Data Available to Every Landlord
Chhloe Xiang (No paywall)On Monday, J.P. Morgan Chase announced that it was piloting a new platform called “Story,” an online real estate management that allows landlords to manage their portfolio of properties, collect rent payments, screen tenants, and view market insights including sales prices and vacancy rates. ... “It's one thing to just enable tenants to submit rent payments online, those kinds of platforms are not uncommon and something that JP Morgan's platform is intended to help do. But these kinds of platforms are aimed at delivering insights to real estate management companies based on data analytics in a space where there's already an abundance of technologies that are making decisions about who gets and maintains access to housing,” [said] Ridhi Shetty, the Policy Counsel with the Center for Democracy and Technology's Privacy & Data Project ... “There are ways in which technology could be leveraged to better improve the lives of renters. Instead, what we're seeing is technology being leveraged to automate inequality for tenants, especially in a moment when their cost of living is being squeezed by massive rent increases.” [said] René Moya, a tenant organizer with the Debt Collective.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7bkyn/jp-morgan-wants-to-make-t…
# International, Privacy and access, Rent, Landlords and agents.‘Wake-up call for real estate agencies’: Harcourts hit by data breach
Tawar Razaghi and Melissa Heagney Domain (No paywall)Real estate company Harcourts has confirmed a data breach occurred at its Melbourne City office, potentially exposing the personal information of tenants, landlords and trades to hackers. The franchisee became aware on October 24 that its rental property database was accessed by an unknown third party without authorisation. For tenants, the personal information potentially breached included names, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers, signatures and photo identification, according to an email sent by the office to its customers and circulated online. For landlords and trades, the data comprised bank details as well as names, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers and signatures. It comes two weeks after security experts and tenancy advocates raised concerns about the potential for data breaches in the industry, which collects copious amounts of information with little oversight. ... Digital Rights Watch program lead Samantha Floreani said a review into the Privacy Act was urgently needed to better protect people’s data. “This is yet another example of why we need comprehensive privacy reform, because as long as companies are collecting too much of our personal information and holding on to it for long periods of time, the risk of harm is going to continue to occur,” Floreani said. Also, read Judd Boaz's article entitled: 'Harcourts Melbourne City real estate agency advises customers of data breach' on the ABC at: [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-02/harcourts-melbourne-real-estate-agent-stafflink-data-breach/101608270].
https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/wake-up-call-for-real-estat…
# Australia, Privacy and access, Rent, Landlords and agents.Negative gearing and capital gains tax discount set to cost the budget $20 billion a year within a decade
Michael Janda ABC (No paywall)The cost of negative gearing is set to blow out as interest rates rise and, with it, the capital gains tax discount is expected to cost the federal budget more than $20 billion a year within a decade. Modelling by the independent Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) — commissioned by Greens leader Adam Bandt — estimated that negative gearing would drain $12.7 billion from budget revenue in 2023-33 at the current cash rate of 2.85 per cent. Should the cash rate rise to 3.35 per cent — fairly close to the Reserve Bank of Australia's estimate of what might be a longer-term "neutral" cash rate — that cost would blow out further, to $13.8 billion.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-03/negative-gearing-and-capi…
# Australia, Rent, Federal Government, Housing market, Tax.A brief history of the mortgage, from its roots in ancient Rome to the English ‘dead pledge’ and its rebirth in America
Michael J Highfield The Conversation (No paywall)Historians trace the origins of mortgage contracts to the reign of King Artaxerxes of Persia, who ruled modern-day Iran in the fifth century B.C. The Roman Empire formalized and documented the legal process of pledging collateral for a loan.
https://theconversation.com/a-brief-history-of-the-mortgage-from…
# History International, Housing market.