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
Sirius sale funds 330 social houses in NSW
Sian Phillips (No paywall)As Sydney's Sirius building is transformed from social housing into multi-million dollar apartments, the NSW government has revealed where money from the sale of the harbourside icon is going.
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/sirius-sale-funds-330-s…
# NSW, Public and community housing, State Government.Housing market records fastest annual growth since 2004
Euan Black The New Daily (No paywall)Sydney property prices increased by about $800 a day in June as the Australian housing market recorded its fastest annual growth since April 2004.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/property/2021/07/01/australia…
# Australia, Housing market.Restoration Australia: an easy watch about heritage glow-ups or another coat of whitewash?
Walter Marsh The Guardian (No paywall)Like a kind of Grand Designs with more trips to the library, Restoration Australia has returned for another season of genteel Victorian houses, crumbling cottages and rambling pastoral homesteads, and the brave (or foolish) homeowners working to rescue them. ... But the limitations of its historical inquiry can sometimes prove frustrating. Series three began earlier this month in fraught territory: Milton Terrace, an 1879 townhouse in the shadow of the Sydney Harbour Bridge bought for $4.2m in 2015 as part of the Baird government’s controversial sell-off of harbourside public housing. We now watch its new property developer owners spend millions more turning several spartan, subdivided government housing flats into one four-storey slice of Mayfair-inspired “global glam”. ... But what about the stories we don’t hear?
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/oct/21/restoration…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Heritage listings, History.Sydney lockdown: Tenants lack eviction protections, adequate financial support, advocates warn
Tawar Razaghi Domain (No paywall)Sydney tenants lack eviction protections and adequate financial support for the latest lockdown, tenant advocates warn after the state government did not go beyond encouraging landlords to be lenient. ... On Tuesday, the NSW government announced a grants package to help thousands of businesses, but it stopped short of measures to help renters – who make up a third of the state’s households – stay in their homes if they lost work and struggled to pay rent. Instead, Treasurer Dominic Perrottet urged landlords to work with tenants who may be going through financial hardship. ... Tenants were left vulnerable again with the lack of financial assistance or clear guidelines and protections, said Leo Patterson Ross, chief executive officer of the Tenants’ Union of NSW. “The lesson of the past 18 months is that negotiation doesn’t work where the two parties aren’t given really clear guidelines about what counts as lenient and coming to the table,” Mr Patterson Ross said.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/sydney-lockdown-tenants-lack-evic…
# TUNSW in the media NSW, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Housing market, State Government.Financial support, eviction protections urged for renters amid Sydney lockdown
Kate Burke Domain (No paywall)Sydney tenants are at risk of falling behind on their rent amid the city’s latest lockdown, with renters’ groups particularly concerned for how income losses will affect those already trying to pay off deferred rent from last year. Swift financial support and protections will be needed to help tenants through Sydney’s second citywide lockdown, with renters now more vulnerable than they were last year – many casual workers already burning through savings to get through 2020. Thousands of renters have already sought advice on the Tenants’ Union of New South Wales website, since Greater Sydney, the Central Coast, Blue Mountains and Wollongong went into lockdown on Saturday, said chief executive officer Leo Patterson Ross, with renters more likely to be in casual employment in hard-hit industries such as hospitality and tourism. ... Some tenants are still protected under a six-month transition period from the eviction moratorium, which ended in March, but those now falling behind on rent for the first time or who had paid off previous deferrals would have to rely on regular tenancy laws, Mr Patterson Ross said. There were no incentives in place either for landlords to enter into negotiations to reduce or defer rents, he added.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/financial-support-and-eviction-pr…
# Hot topic, TUNSW in the media NSW, Eviction, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, State Government.‘He was someone’s son’: Suburb farewells a friend and gentle giant
Michael Koziol The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)On an eerie Friday afternoon, as lockdown descended on Sydney’s east and the city braced itself for worse to come, a small group of mourners gathered in an otherwise desolate North Sydney CBD. Peter, a homeless man who had turned an alcove on windy Arthur Street into his makeshift abode for the past year, died last week on a cold winter’s night. He was 48.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/he-was-someone-s-son-suburb-…
# NSW, Homelessness, Personal stories.Housing assistance in Australia
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (No paywall)In 2019–20, just over 800,000 Australians lived in social housing in over 436,000 dwellings across the country. The majority (69%) of social housing dwellings were public housing stock and Community Housing (24%) with increasing numbers in community housing. Commonwealth Rent Assistance was provided to just over 1.7 million income units at the end of June 2020. Chock-a-block with data. Check their media release at: [https://www.aihw.gov.au/news-media/media-releases/2021-1/june/436-000-social-housing-dwellings-across-australia].
https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/housing-assistance/housing-assis…
# Research alert Australia, Aboriginal renters, Public and community housing, Federal Government, Housing market, Minimum habitability standards.There was a lower proportion of social housing in Australia last year than a decade ago
SBS (No paywall)There are some 436,000 social housing dwellings in Australia, accommodating more than 800,000 people. But the nation's stock is not keeping pace with growth in the rest of the housing sector, a new report released on Wednesday by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare showed. The institute's report on housing assistance showed the proportion of social housing decreased from 4.7 per cent of all dwellings in 2010 to 4.2 per cent last year.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/there-was-a-lower-proportion-of-soci…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Housing market.