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
NSW government rejects Inner West boarding house safety proposal
Daniel Lo Surdo (No paywall)Inner West mayor Darcy Byrne has said that a proposal to jointly review the safety of boarding houses in the wake of the March Newtown fire has been rejected by the NSW government. Earlier this month, Inner West councillors unanimously supported a motion urgently requesting the NSW government to participate in a joint local and state review of boarding house management and regulations after a fire at a Probert Street boarding house in Newtown killed three people last month. (Inner West Independent)
https://cityhubsydney.com.au/2022/04/nsw-government-rejects-inne…
# NSW, Boarders and lodgers, Housing market, Local Government, State Government.The electorates where buyers will feel the pinch from rising interest rates
Rachel Clun The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)First-home buyers in growing suburbs on the fringes of Sydney and Melbourne are the most at risk of struggling with rising interest rates when the Reserve Bank starts lifting the cash rate to combat inflation. The suburbs are in some of the nation’s most marginal electorates, setting up an election clash over the cost of living and which party is best to manage the economy after more than a decade without interest rate rises.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-electorates-where-bu…
# Australia, Federal Government, Home ownership, Housing market.Aged care: What the major parties are promising this election
Ellen Coulter ABC (No paywall)Glen O'Driscoll has been living out of his suitcase in hotel and motel rooms for the past four months. He's a registered nurse, plugging staff shortages at aged care homes with COVID-19 outbreaks across New South Wales. "COVID has not gone away, it's still very much present in aged care," he said. Mr O'Driscoll, who's a member and former branch secretary of the nursing union, says COVID-19 has put pressure on the sector but he was seeing chronic staffing issues well before the pandemic. ... It's been more than a year since the aged care royal commission painted a damning picture of an understaffed aged care system riddled with substandard care and an underpaid and under-trained workforce. Mr O'Driscoll says for staff, nothing has changed. "[Staff] work double shifts, they work overtime, they work extended shifts, they are tired, they are worn out," he said.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-27/aged-care-what-the-major-…
# Australia, Coronavirus COVID-19, Federal Government, Housing market, Older people, Work, employment.Apartment price falls signal end to Sydney’s pandemic property boom
Kate Burke and Elizabeth Redman Domain (No paywall)Sydney’s runaway property sector has been reined in by a significant market slowdown, with sales having their weakest results since early stages of the pandemic. Sydney unit prices dipped 1.2 per cent to a median of $796,524 in the March quarter, the latest Domain House Price Report shows, while house prices rose a marginal 0.2 per cent to a median of almost $1,591,000 — the weakest performance for both since the June quarter of 2020.
https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/apartment-price-falls-signa…
# NSW, Coronavirus COVID-19, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market.Older people housing support provider forced to close due to ‘challenging operating environment’
Lucie Heath Inside Housing (Paywall)Care and Repair England, which supports older people to live independently in their homes, will have no staff in post from 29 April and anticipates that it will enter into liquidation on 5 May. The charity, which was set up in 1986 by Shelter and the Housing Associations Charitable Trust (HACT), aims to increase the availability of practical housing support for older people to help them adapt and maintain their homes. In a statement announcing its closure on its website, the charity said that raising funds has “become ever more difficult” and citied a “challenging operating environment”. ... It said its decision to close was “particularly sad news at a time of rising poverty among older people, greater housing hardship and increasing inequalities, when practical housing help for those living in poor or unsuitable homes is needed more than ever”. “Despite the strong evidence and data about the connections between ageing, disadvantage, poor housing and health, effective policies, funding and action to tackle non-decent homes are all notable by their absence,” it added.
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/news/older-people-housing-s…
# International, Home ownership, Older people.Why negative gearing has gone the way of the dinosaur
Noel Whittaker The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)It is an entirely different world today. With record-low interest rates and reasonably high property investment yields, negative gearing is all but impossible.
https://www.smh.com.au/money/borrowing/why-negative-gearing-has-…
# Australia, Rent, Federal Government, Landlords and agents, Tax.As Tasmanian councils end COVID freeze on rate rises, households brace for the pinch
Selina Ross ABC (No paywall)Like councils across Tasmania, Launceston froze its rates in the 2020-21 financial year as the COVID-19 pandemic hit the state. It resulted in lost revenue in excess of $2.2 million. Local Government Association president Christina Holmdahl said it was now a challenging time for councils as they tried to catch up. ... Last year, the Tasmanian Council of Social Services (TasCOSS) urged councils to balance their need to raise rates against the cost of living pressures faced by Tasmanian households.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-04-22/households-feeling-pressu…
# Australia, Housing market, Local Government, Tax.Why you should be investing in sustainable homes
Sue Williams Domain (No paywall)Investors all over Australia are now looking more closely at buying more energy-efficient homes. Future-proofing an investment property can reduce running costs and attract, and retain, good tenants. ... But the options are far greater than just investing in individual smart homes. “Build-to-rent [B2R] is becoming a serious asset class in Australia, and you have companies like Mirvac with their B2R club with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation,” Rooney says. “Retirement living is also an asset, with so much work done by Lendlease to green their product. “These are more scaleable investment products in the residential space, good for mum and dad investors as well as institutional investors. “We’re now also on the path to having a national framework for the energy disclosures of homes. At the moment, we get an energy rating for our fridges, but we don’t for homes, except in Canberra.”
https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/why-you-should-be-investing…
# Australia, Rent, Climate change, Housing market, Landlords and agents, Minimum habitability standards, Older people.