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
Census 2021 — Australia as 100 people
Matt Martino, Julian Fell, Ben Spraggon, and Cristen Tilley ABC (No paywall)The census is Australia’s biggest survey. Every five years it attempts to question every household across the country to create a big data snapshot of the nation. There’s a lot it can tell us about Australia’s 25,422,788 people. Also, this article on the ABC provides some highlights. Go to: [https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-28/highlights-from-the-census-data-that-you-might-have-missed/101189230] Check out this download hot off the press at: https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/housing/housing-census/2021. Also, check ABS's media release entitled: '2021 Census count includes Australians living on wheels and water, but most of us still firmly on land' at: [https://www.abs.gov.au/media-centre/media-releases/2021-census-count-includes-australians-living-wheels-and-water-most-us-still-firmly-land] ... but no mention in this media release about renters! Check the article entitled: 'Proportion of Australian houses owned outright has fallen in past 30 years, census data shows' in 'The Guardian' at: [https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/jun/28/proportion-of-australian-houses-owned-outright-has-fallen-in-past-30-years-census-data-shows]. Check out this YouTube from ABC News at: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvaCWQ5OVMs&ab_channel=ABCNews%28Australia%29]. Check out the interactive map at: [https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/ng-interactive/2022/jun/28/census-2021-australia-abs-data-results-online-australian-bureau-of-statistics-date-covid-19-coronavirus-suburb-town-city-demographics-map-interactive] And, Check Osman Faruqi'snopinion piece in 'The Sydney Morning Herald; at: [https://www.smh.com.au/national/census-exposes-the-forgotten-australians-20220629-p5axn7.html] He writes: 'Look at housing, for example. ... Politicians are far more likely to own property and far less likely to rent than the average Australian, which is just one example of the gulf between the people who make decisions and the rest of us who deal with the consequences.'
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-29/census-australia-as-100-p…
# Australia, Aboriginal renters, Public and community housing, Rent, Families, Health, Home ownership, Housing market, Landlords and agents, Planning and development.Greens hail Covid Recovery Bill as ‘first step of real rent reform’
(No paywall)The Coronavirus Recovery and Reform Bill will strengthen the rights of tenants and make it harder for landlords to evict tenants, according to the Scottish Greens. The Bill, which passed its final stage following a debate in the Scottish Parliament yesterday, will abolish mandatory grounds for eviction, such as a landlord selling a house. ... Now, all grounds for evicting tenants are discretionary meaning all evictions must be ruled as reasonable by a tribunal. Speaking ahead of the debate, Scottish Greens housing spokesperson, Ariane Burgess MSP, said: “Access to good quality housing is a fundamental right and one that underpins the health, wellbeing, happiness and life chances of people everywhere. This Bill will be a big step forward for tenants, and will provide vital protections from eviction. (Scottish Housing News)
https://www.scottishhousingnews.com/articles/greens-hail-covid-r…
# International, Eviction, Rent, Tribunal NCAT, Housing market, Human rights, Landlords and agents, No-grounds evictions.The month in numbers: will the Renters’ Reform Bill stop evictions into homelessness?
Lucie Heath Inside Housing (Paywall)This month the government published a white paper outlining a series of much-needed reforms to the private rented sector. At the heart of the proposals is the plan to abolish Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions and scrap assured shorthold tenancies (ASTs) in favour of periodic tenancies. The plans have been welcomed by campaigners, who have been waiting eagerly for movement since former prime minister Theresa May first promised to abolish Section 21 back in 2019. Alongside giving a sense of security to England’s estimated 4.4 million privately renting households, it is hoped that the reforms will help stop evictions into homelessness. Do the reforms go far enough in this regard?
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/home/home/the-month-in-numbers-w…
# International, Eviction, Public and community housing, Rent, Homelessness, No-grounds evictions.Home ownership falls, mortgage stress rises in Sydney, census reveals
Matt Wade The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The rate of home ownership in Sydney has fallen and the share of home borrowers under financial pressure has more than doubled during the past five years despite a sustained period of record low-interest rates. The 2021 census released on Tuesday showed 61.1 per cent of homes in the city were owned outright or with a mortgage, down 1.1 percentage points since 2016. That compared with a small improvement in the nationwide rate of home ownership which edged half a percentage point higher to 66 per cent. The census revealed one in every five Sydney home borrowers had repayments that exceed 30 per cent of household income, compared to about one in 12 borrowers in 2016. Those spending more than 30 per cent of household income to service a home loan are commonly defined as being in mortgage stress. ... The share of Sydney tenants under financial pressure because of their housing is even higher, with over a third of renters devoting 30 per cent or more of their income to rents. Here, you will find a number of useful interactive maps.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/home-ownership-falls…
# NSW, Rent, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market, Planning and development, Sydney.The Insecurity of Renting in Australia
ABC (No paywall)More Australians are seeking rental properties than there are properties available. With over one million properties empty and with rental prices rising, there is fear that home ownership will become nearly impossible for the next generation. We speak to Leo Patterson Ross- Advocacy and Research Officer at Tenants Union NSW and Michael Fotheringham - The Managing Director of the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute for their take on the current housing environment in Australia and where it is heading. (ABC Nightlife)
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/nightlife/rental/13950708
# TUNSW in the media, Audio Australia, Repairs, No-grounds evictions.Sydney and Melbourne property prices set to tumble, say analysts
Peter Hannam The Guardian (No paywall)Property price falls in Sydney and Melbourne are gaining momentum as borrowing costs rise, setting a trend likely to be followed in other state capitals, according to industry analysts CoreLogic. ... Rents are rising at an annual rate of 9% nationally, with vacancy rates typically around just 1% or near record lows. With international markets beginning to reopen, bringing more students and migrants, Lawless [CoreLogic’s founder and research director] expected to see additional rental demand flowing into Australia. “Potentially, we see renters really struggling with rental affordability,” he said. The likely result is that property investors will be wooed back into the market over the next six to nine months as gross rental yields return to more typical levels, Lawless predicted. Their return may help taper the fall in property prices.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/jun/28/sydney-an…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market, Landlords and agents.Australians are more millennial, multilingual and less religious: what the census reveals
Peter Martin The Conversation (No paywall)Census data to be released Tuesday shows Australia changing rapidly before COVID, gaining an extra one million residents from overseas in the past five years, almost all of them in the three years before borders were closed. ... The information released on Monday showed the overall proportion of Australians owning their homes was little changed. The information released on Tuesday will report those proportions by age group and city.
https://theconversation.com/australians-are-more-millennial-mult…
# Australia, Home ownership.If you think Denmark is all Borgen and social equality, take a look at its awful ‘ghetto’ law
Hettie O'Brien The Guardian (No paywall)The eviction of ‘non-western’ housing estate residents shows the darker side of so-called social harmony. Aslam has lived on the estate since 1987. For all that time, his home has been Mjølnerparken, a leafy public housing estate of squat red-brick blocks in the centre of Copenhagen. ... But the government has classified Mjølnerparken as a “ghetto”, and plans to slash its public housing stock to no more than 40% of the total. ... Aslam and most others living in Mjølnerparken are Danish citizens but, as they were not born in western countries, they are treated as foreigners in their own homes. Aslam’s children were born in Denmark, attended Danish schools and have Danish university degrees. Because their father was born in Pakistan, they too are deemed “non-western”. This is not a story of gentrification or the hidden hand of the market, pricing people out of city centres. It is worse than that. It is, in effect, state-directed population control. ... What is playing out on this estate is far from just a local issue. In 2017, the country’s parliament expressed concern that people they considered true Danes were becoming a minority in some areas. The ghetto law was passed the following year. By breaking up these communities, the government hopes to confront what it calls “parallel societies”.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jun/27/denmark-gh…
# International, Public and community housing, Estate renewal, Race and ethnicity.