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
Elderly woman who lost house in Whalan explosion moved to temporary housing with restrictions on visitors
Sarah Gerathy ABC (No paywall)When an explosion ripped through a row of social housing townhouses at Whalan in Western Sydney, 86-year-old Ninette Dawson lost her home of 17 years. Since then she has been living in a temporary accommodation facility at Blacktown with women and children fleeing domestic violence, which has restrictions in place that have prevented her family from visiting. As she speaks to her daughter in Brisbane on the phone, Ninette's voice cracks as she tells her: "I just feel sad today, but then I'm sad every day." Her daughter Shareen Dawson fights back her own tears and as she tells her mum: "I know, hopefully it won't be too much longer."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-27/elderly-woman-lost-house-…
# Must read NSW, Disasters, Public and community housing, Rent, Repairs.Legislative changes implemented to make residential land lease community fees fairer
Keira Proust ABC (No paywall)Daryl Rowe is one of about 40,000 people who rely on residential land lease communities as an affordable housing option in New South Wales. The 57-year-old moved into Kincumber Nautical Village on the New South Wales Central Coast eight years ago, but has struggled to keep up with increasing site fees ever since. Mr Rowe's fortnightly site costs are just less than half of his disability pension. "When I moved in it was $175 a week, which I could cope with, but now it's up to nearly $500 a fortnight," he said. "Everything is a bit tight — I'm not buying many luxury things … just the bare minimum that I have to, really."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-07/residential-land-lease-co…
# Must read NSW, Land lease communities.More than 400 build-to-rent homes will be allocated to essential workers
ABC (No paywall)The NSW government has announced that the upcoming budget will include a $450 million dollar package for housing for essential workers. It's a way the state is trying to keep essential workers in places they are desperately needed. Homes will be offered to workers like teachers, paramedics, police officers and firefighters at a discount to the market rent.
https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/sydney-breakfast/400-buil…
# Audio NSW, Rent.Thousands of short-stay rentals flouting registration rules in Sydney, research finds
Tamsin Rose The Guardian (No paywall)The City of Sydney will call for major reforms to the short-term rental sector as it raises concerns that thousands of properties on hosting sites such as Airbnb have been operating without valid registrations. Research commissioned by the city found that while there were about 2,500 active properties in the Sydney local government area (LGA) last year, according to New South Wales government figures, there were closer to 5,500 properties active in the area according to data sourced from AirDNA, a rental insights company based in the US.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/article/2024/jun/13/s…
# Hot topic NSW, Rent.First public land slated for housing revealed, but no word on Illawarra sites
Natalie Croxon Illawarra Mercury (Soft Paywall)New homes will be built in Camden under the NSW government’s release of surplus public land, but the government is remaining tight-lipped as to whether any sites will become available in the Illawarra. The government revealed on Monday the first of the 44 locations identified in an audit of public land to free up sites for the construction of 30,000 new homes, as the state contends with an ongoing crisis. The estimated 10 homes in Camden will be a mix of public and affordable homes and will be built on Menangle Road.Another 500 homes – half of which will be social and affordable dwellings – will be constructed at the Carriageworks precinct near Redfern Station in North Eveleigh, up to 83 homes will be built in Kellyville, and Camperdown will gain 100-plus homes. As she announced the first sites, Housing Minister Rose Jackson said more would be released progressively over the coming months.
# Hot topic NSW, Rent.‘A diabolical mess’: How did we get into this housing crisis, and how do we get out?
Angus Holland and Josh Gordon The Sydney Morning Herald (No paywall)ienna, the celebrated home of Freud, Mozart, Beethoven and cherry strudel, is in many ways quite similar to Sydney and Melbourne. All three regularly compete for the (somewhat dubious) title of “world’s most liveable city”. All have good coffee, low-ish crime, attractive historic buildings, opera houses and excellent pastries (OK, Vienna wins on the strudel, not to mention its famous Sachertorte and the artery-clogging Cremeschnitte). In one critical way, though, the Austrian capital is completely different to Australia’s major cities. In Vienna, around half the population lives in public housing.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/a-diabolical-mess-how-did-we-get…
# Hot topic Australia, Public and community housing.Treaty inquiry slams 'illusion of concern' on housing
SBS (No paywall)Victoria's truth telling inquiry has grilled the state's housing minister over a lack of progress in improving outcomes for Aboriginal Victorians. Giving evidence at the Yoorrook Justice Commission, state Housing Minister Harriet Shing apologised for the dispossession of land and ongoing disadvantage faced by Aboriginal communities. "We created Aboriginal homelessness and then we turned away from it, and for too long, we refused to even acknowledge that its existence and impact was our doing," Ms Shing told the commission.
"For that, I am sorry."
https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/article/treaty-inquiry-slams-illusio…
# Must read Australia, Aboriginal renters, Eviction.Landlords making 'baseless' claims on rental bonds as a matter of course, law firm claims
Jesse Thompson ABC (No paywall)The way Judy saw it, many contracts come with a cooling-off period. She didn't expect withdrawing from a new lease to be much different. It was late in 2022 when a dispute over the move-in date led Judy to reconsider her new tenancy in a three-bedroom home in Melbourne's inner-west. "Within an hour of signing the lease, we made it clear we didn't want to move in," the lifelong renter, who only wanted her first name used, said. "We didn't receive the keys. We thought it would be a fairly clean-cut exit and requested my [bond] deposit was returned."
She was proven wrong the hard way.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-07-02/landlords-making-baseless…
# Must read Australia, Bond.