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
WA’s housing crisis is also a health crisis
Betsy Buchanan The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Access to healthcare is fundamental to our wellbeing, and to our collective sense of social justice and the functioning of our society. So it is with housing, another basic human right denied to too many of WA’s most vulnerable families. ... [Alice is] a very sick little girl – her lungs partially collapsed by bronchial disease and chronic asthma. Alice has spent several of the last 12 months in a hospital bed at Perth Children’s Hospital. And when she’s not there, she’s often sleeping in a car with her mum. Since being evicted by the Department of Communities at the start of the COVID pandemic, Sharra says she has tried for dozens of rental properties with no success.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/western-australia/wa-s-housing-c…
# Australia, Aboriginal renters, Eviction, Public and community housing, Health, Homelessness.The solution to underquoting? Push to publish reserve prices
Henrietta Cook The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)As concerns grow about underquoting in Australia’s booming property market, an outspoken group of real estate agents and buyers agents are calling on the Victorian government to make it compulsory to advertise reserve prices before auctions. “Underquoting is rife,” Ms Jamonts said. “The problem would be fixed overnight if there was legislation requiring reserve prices to be published.” She said disclosing this information delivered better results for vendors and buyers.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/victoria/the-solution-to-underqu…
# Australia, Housing market, Landlords and agents, State Government.Where Sydney rents are getting more expensive and where they’re getting cheaper
Tawar Razaghi Domain (No paywall)Sydney’s roaring property boom has spilled over into the rental market, with asking rents for big houses in lifestyle areas rocketing to record heights, new data reveals.
Renters in coastal suburbs of the northern beaches, Sutherland Shire and the central coast are spending months desperately looking for a house, offering more than the asking rent and resorting to securing properties off-market, as they compete with would-be buyers who have been priced out of these areas and forced to rent instead.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/the-sydney-suburbs-renters-have-t…
# NSW, Rent, Housing market.Developer forced to stop work on Bellevue Hill apartments due to defects
Matt O'Sullivan The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)The developer of an apartment building in one of Sydney’s wealthiest suburbs has been ordered to immediately stop work on the complex due to serious defects, further delaying buyers of its multimillion-dollar units from moving in for at least another six months.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/developer-forced-to-stop-wor…
# NSW, Housing market, Minimum habitability standards.‘Computer says no’: NSW Planning Minister says rules are stifling good design
Angus Thompson The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)NSW Planning Minister Rob Stokes says urban development is suffering from a “computer says no” approach partly owing to a history of corruption, in responding to wide-ranging criticism over the flexibility of his city building overhaul. ... n a rare convergence, the NSW government is facing criticism from the development and environmental lobbies, among a list of other entities, for the lack of prescriptiveness in its watershed Design and Place state planning policy, that promotes principles rather than box-ticking when it comes to creating neighbourhoods.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/computer-says-no-nsw-plannin…
# NSW, Planning and development, State Government.Miami condo collapse death toll hits 64 as rescue efforts end
Lauren Aratani The Guardian (No paywall)Rescue efforts at the site of the Champlain Towers South collapse in Surfside, Florida, officially ended late on Wednesday night as officials have said there is no chance of life in the rubble. More victims were recovered on Thursday, bringing the death toll by the early evening to 64 and the number of those still unaccounted for down to 76. ... The Florida state attorney’s office announced on Wednesday that a grand jury in Miami-Dade had agreed to investigate building safety policies afrer a request from the state attorney, Katherine Fernandez Rundle, according to the Miami Herald. The grand jury will explore “recommendations to prevent such a disaster from occurring again, not just in Surfside”, Fernandez Rundle said in a statement. The grand jury will also investigate the cause of the collapse. A former Florida state representative told NBC News that condos were once required by law to plan for repairs, but the law was repealed in 2010 after pushback from real estate lawyers and property managers. Recent reports have revealed infighting between condo residents at Champlain Towers South over the cost and scope of necessary repairs halted work that needed to be done on the building.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/08/miami-condo-coll…
# International, Housing market, Minimum habitability standards.Where investors are making the most money on property in Australia
Sue Williams Domain (No paywall)Investors are reaping huge returns on many homes around the country, with the yield on one type of property – apartments in Darwin – smashing all records since they began.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/where-investors-are-making-the-mo…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market, Landlords and agents.Renters looking for a bargain out of luck as prices surge again in most capitals
Adrian Lowe Domain (No paywall)Rental prices in many capital cities have surged over the past year, with some of the biggest increases in almost 15 years leaving many Australian renters out of luck.
The median weekly asking price for house rents is at a record high in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Hobart and Canberra, new data reveals, at its highest in six years in Perth and Darwin and $10 off its record in Melbourne. And apartment prices are little better: in Brisbane, Adelaide and Canberra, they are at a record high while Perth’s are at their highest since 2015, and the highest since 2016 in Darwin.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/renters-looking-for-a-bargain-out…
# Australia, Rent, Housing market.