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
Housing sector has lost ‘empathy’, says tenant body leader
Lucie Heath Inside Housing (Paywall)Jenny Osbourne, chief executive at Tpas (Tenant Participation Advisory Service), England, also told the Housing 2021 conference in Manchester today that the sector employed “some of the wrong people with the wrong values” over the past decade. She was speaking during a panel discussion about the new consumer regulation arm of the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH), which is being introduced following the Social Housing White Paper and will see the regulator given more power to intervene on disrepair issues.
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/housing-sector-has-lost-emp…
# International, Public and community housing, Repairs.Death on our streets
Giovanni Torre (No paywall)At least eight Noongar women have died homeless in Perth this winter, including six on the streets, sparking renewed calls for action to address the homelessness crisis. In 2020, 56 homeless people died on the streets, 28 per cent of them Indigenous. Another homeless man was found dead in the Perth CBD last week. There are more than 1000 people sleeping rough on the streets of Perth each night, with 40 per cent Indigenous. (National Indigenous Times)
# Australia, Public and community housing, Homelessness, Race and ethnicity.Social housing residents protest 'overpolicing' after alcohol confiscated, packages searched
Eden Gillespie SBS (No paywall)Residents of the Common Ground Towers in Sydney protested 'overpolicing' on Saturday after The Feed revealed this week that officers were searching packages and confiscating alcohol under the direction of NSW Health. Residents in 104 homes in the social housing towers have been living under a hard lockdown for 10 days, following the detection of four cases of COVID-19 in the building last Thursday. The Common Grounds Resident Action Group said they had organised the protests on Thursday and Saturday to call for an end to 'overpolicing', as well as a rent refund for their time in lockdown. The building is run by Mission Australia, with most residents having experienced long-term homelessness.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/social-housing-residents-protest-ove…
# NSW, Public and community housing, Coronavirus COVID-19.‘Who knows what the inside is like?’ The Australians buying houses they have never seen
Calla Wahlquist The Guardian (No paywall)Erin Lyall has spent the past five weeks walking the streets of Sunbury via Google Street View, looking at houses. It’s not how she imagined buying her first home. But with Melbourne spending nine of the past 15 weeks in lockdown, and the clock ticking on her financial approval, Lyall decided not to wait. ... On Tuesday the 35-year-old and her partner made an offer on a house they had seen only through photos and videos, conditional on the property passing a building and pest inspection. It was refused, in favour of an offer with no building inspection requirement. Probably a sign of a narrow escape, Lyall says, but not enough to put her off doing it all again if the right home comes up.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/11/who-knows…
# Australia, Coronavirus COVID-19, Home ownership, Housing market.Australian property: Delivering Walkmans in a smartphone world
Shane Wright The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Our tax system, our monetary policy settings, our fiscal settings and even our television programs all drive us to sink money into real estate rather than something that might be riskier but could deliver huge, long-term gains. [Read on]
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/australian-property-deli…
# Australia, Housing market, Tax.Victoria's affordable housing project kicks off with $740m worth of projects to build 2,300 homes
Mary McDonald, Kimberley Price, and Alexander Darling ABC (No paywall)The first funds have been allocated for a multi-million dollar spend on social housing in Victoria. Dubbed the Big Housing Build, the first round of funding will see $738 million invested in 89 projects. More than 2,300 new homes will be built, with the bulk to be ready for tenants by next year. ... The new homes will be accessible for people with disabilities, and there will be dedicated properties for people in need suffering mental health issues, escaping domestic violence, experiencing homelessness and Victoria’s First Peoples.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-10/victoria-big-housing-buil…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Housing market.'Liar loans' on the rise as risky mortgages drive house price boom
Michael Janda and Gareth Hutchens ABC (No paywall)Australian home prices have surged almost 20 per cent over the past year, and investment bank UBS has warned that a record level of "liar loans" as buyers "chase the market" could be one reason why. The bank's annual survey of around 900 people who took out a mortgage over the past year showed that 41 per cent submitted loan applications that were not completely factually accurate — so-called "liar loans". That is a record high in the seven years UBS has collected this data ... Property investors were also more likely to falsify their loan applications (at 53 per cent with one investment property and 57 per cent for those with two) versus owner-occupiers (31 per cent).
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-11/liar-home-loans-mortgage-…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market, Landlords and agents.NSW Health limits residents of locked-down tower block to six beers per day
Anton Nilsson and James O'Doherty (No paywall)Residents in a Sydney tower block under a strict coronavirus lockdown are having their alcohol deliveries policed. Residents in apartment blocks locked-down by NSW Health are having their alcohol deliveries policed as part of a policy to limit the number of drinks being consumed each day. NSW Health has imposed rules limiting people in “NSW Health controlled buildings” to a certain amount of alcohol each day in a bid to “ensure the safety of health staff and residents”. Mission Australia’s Common Ground building in Camperdown is the latest building where occupants are subjected to the harsh rules. (news.com.au)
https://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/news/nsw-health-limits-…
# NSW, Public and community housing, Coronavirus COVID-19, Health, State Government.