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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See notes about the Digest and a list of other contributors here. Many thanks to those contributors for sharing links with us.
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Archive
Labor leader Anthony Albanese lists Marrickville investment house for $2.1m
Lucy Macken Domain (No paywall)Sydney’s booming housing market has lured Labor leader Anthony “Albo” Albanese and former NSW deputy premier Carmel Tebbutt to the market, listing their Marrickville investment property for $2.1 million.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/labor-leader-anthony-albanese-lis…
# NSW, Landlords and agents.Flexible designs for multi-generational homes
Matilda Marozzi ABC (No paywall)While Alf Lee is in the privileged position to have bought property, he doesn't think his kids will be so lucky given the soaring house prices in Melbourne. So when it was decided his ageing parents would sell their house and move in with Alf, his wife Emma and their two children, the family wanted to create a home where the three generations could continue to live together — with privacy — as their lives change.
"My parents don't want to feel as though they've lost their independence," Alf says. (ABC Everyday)
https://www.abc.net.au/everyday/designing-multi-generational-hom…
# Australia, Families, Housing market.Meet the landlords forced to bribe tenants to leave properties
Rachel Mortimer and Melissa Lawford (Paywall)I even offered to pay the deposit on a new rental to get rid of them', one buy-to-let investor said ... 'I even offered to pay the deposit on a new rental to get rid of them', one buy-to-let investor said. (The Telegraph)
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-to-let/meet-landlords-f…
# International, Landlords and agents.July 2021 News
Shelter NSW (No paywall)Check out the latest housing news from Shelter NSW:
NAIDOC week
Waterloo South estate renewal proposal - Minister for Planning gives the green light for next stage
Shelter NSW in the news
NSW Budget – horses or houses? Where’s the priority?
NSW Government proposals on public exhibition
Internship at Shelter NSW
Zest Awards
https://mailchi.mp/shelternsw/shelter-nsw-july-ebulletin?e=91e8d…
# NSW, Campaigns and law reform.Statement by NSW Labor leader Chris Minns
The Guardian (No paywall)At 14:27 Saturday, 10 July 2021 ... NSW Labor leader Chris Minns has issued a statement calling for a new economic support package to assist businesses through the lockdown. He’s called for rent relief, a tourism support package, and support for workers, among other things. Here's the original Twitter at: [https://twitter.com/MinnsChris/status/1413674737880891395/photo/1]
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2021/jul/10/aust…
# Hot topic NSW, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19.Plan to make it harder to kick tenants out a ‘breach of human rights’
Felicity Caldwell The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)A Greens plan to make it harder for landlords to kick tenants out would breach the Queensland Human Rights Act, Housing Minister Leeanne Enoch claims. But Greens MP Amy MacMahon has dismissed the claims as “nonsense”. ... The Greens’ plan would cap rent increases to once every 24 months by no more than CPI, ban rental bidding, and end “no grounds evictions”, even when a fixed-term contract was due to expire or the owner wanted to sell the property. ... “[End of fixed term] means Queensland families can get kicked out of their homes without good reason,” alliance member and Tenants Queensland chief executive Penny Carr said.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/queensland/plan-to-make-it-harde…
# Hot topic Australia, Eviction, Human rights, No-grounds evictions, State Government.Government urged to build 17,000 homes for domestic violence victims to fix ‘shocking’ situation
Jennifer Duke The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)A surge in domestic violence cases during the coronavirus pandemic has prompted calls for the federal government to pour billions of dollars into social housing to close a shortfall of almost 17,000 homes for women fleeing abuse. Spending $7.6 billion on almost 17,000 new homes would help the more than 9000 women a year who become homeless due to domestic and family violence and a lack of stable housing, an Equity Economics report, Nowhere To Go, shows.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/government-urged-to-buil…
# Hot topic, Research alert Australia, Domestic violence, Public and community housing, Federal Government.Soaring rental prices creating housing crisis in regional NSW
Kate Burke Domain (No paywall)A growing number of regional cities and towns across NSW are in the midst of a rental crisis, as short supply and a surge in sea and tree changers leaving Sydney see rental prices soar. ... “We keep getting calls from people being evicted in order to make way for higher rents, and then they aren’t able to find a new home that is affordable and are accepting much lower quality and losing amenity, or they have to leave town, then there is a flow-on effect to other regions,” said chief executive [of the Tenants' Union of NSW,] Leo Patterson Ross.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/soaring-rental-prices-creating-ho…
# TUNSW in the media NSW, Rent, Housing market, Regional NSW.