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 Labor leader Chris Minns pins election hopes on new faces as he announces shadow cabinet
ABC (No paywall)NSW Labor leader Chris Minns has announced his new frontbench promising "renewal, change and new ideas". ... Michael Daley will step into the shoes of Shadow Attorney-General; Rose Jackson, Shadow Minister for Water, Housing and Homelessness; Courtney Houssos, Shadow Minister for Better Regulation and Innovation; Paul Scully has moved from Shadow Minister for Planning; Penny Sharpe has the environment portfolio. Same story at: [https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/real-generational-change-chris-minns-reveals-new-labor-frontbench-20210611-p580dk.html] For the full Shadow Cabinet, go to: [https://twitter.com/MinnsChris/status/1403263846945525764]
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-12/nsw-labor-leader-chris-mi…
# NSW, State Government.Women fleeing domestic violence ‘trapped’ in refuges due to lack of housing, advocates say
Ben Smee The Guardian (No paywall)Women and children fleeing domestic violence in Queensland have spent years “trapped” in refuges and other crisis accommodation due to a chronic shortage of secure long-term housing. Community organisations that run domestic and family violence refuges say the situation creates a bottleneck in crisis accommodation – leaving vulnerable women with an “impossible choice” of living for extended periods in secondary homelessness or choosing to return to unsafe or violent relationships.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/jun/09/women-fle…
# Australia, Rent, Homelessness, Housing market.Boarders face homelessness with eviction next month
Sage Swinton (Paywall)Dozens of residents, including recovering drug addicts, elderly citizens, and people with disabilities, are facing homelessness after being issued 29-day eviction notices on their Cooks Hill boarding house. ... The property was bought last year by Aspen Group, which says the building is old, being completed in 1954, and in need of major repairs. Here's a media report at the time of purchase. Go to: [https://www.realestatesource.com.au/aspen-buys-newcastle-build-to-rent-block/]. You can check out Aspen's 'Ethical, Social & Corporate Governance' Statement at: [https://aspenholidayparks.com.au/investor/ethical-social-and-corporate-governance/]
https://app.newcastleherald.com.au/2021/06/11/boarders-face-home…
# NSW, Boarders and lodgers, Eviction, Regional NSW.Our own Nomadland: the Australians caught in a COVID blind spot
Amanda Davies and Sarah Prout Quicke The Conversation (No paywall)Australians have been told to stay home during lockdowns to prevent the spread of COVID-19. While evidence of the efficacy of this approach as a public health strategy during a pandemic is compelling, lockdowns and mobility restrictions are inevitably disruptive for many – virtually everyone. However, a group that has largely been overlooked is Australia’s nomadic population. Periods of lockdown are particularly challenging for these people, who live in vans, RVs, caravans and boats.
https://theconversation.com/our-own-nomadland-the-australians-ca…
# Australia, Land lease communities, Coronavirus COVID-19, Housing market.There is an evictions crisis happening right under our noses
Aditya Chakrabortty The Guardian (No paywall)From the United Kingdom ... For weeks, newspapers and campaigners have been warning of a looming evictions crisis. Of landlords free again, as of this month, to set the bailiffs on their tenants. Of hundreds of thousands of people losing their homes. Of an entire market teetering on a “cliff edge”. A terrifying prospect – except it doesn’t lie in the distance. An evictions crisis is already here and it is ripping through people’s lives.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jun/10/evictions-…
# International, Eviction, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Housing market.How much our cold flats are really costing us
Mikaela Wilkes (No paywall)OPINION: A strange and unfamiliar sensation settled over me the first time I stepped foot inside the Auckland home I now rent. I took my heavy coat off and the surface of my skin turned tingled from the abrupt temperature change from the crisp air on the porch. The crackle of a fresh log on a fireplace bathed the lounge in a welcoming glow. The long timber hallway typical of villas opened out into the kitchen and dining at the other end of the house, but the space was equally cosy, in the mid-June evening, thanks to the gentle whirring of a heat pump. Warmth. For the first time in my young adult life, I had stumbled upon an affordable bedroom that didn’t immediately make me want to take refuge under a thick set of covers. Jackpot.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/homed/renting/125226508/how-m…
# International, Rent, Utilities electricity water gas, Minimum habitability standards.Indigenous eviction prevention program's last-ditch bid to survive
Claire Moodie ABC (No paywall)Patricia Williams watches as a team of workers marches into her public housing home in Perth's northern suburbs, removing piles of hard rubbish and cleaning mould and dirt from the walls and floors. The 60-year-old grandmother has put up the white flag, calling for support to help her deal with the mess and unpaid bills that have been threatening to have her evicted from her home of 11 years.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-13/wa-indigenous-eviction-pr…
# Australia, Aboriginal renters, Eviction, Public and community housing, Families, Health, Homelessness.Has COVID induced property vacancies swung the balances of power in the inner-city property market?
Daniel Lo Surdo (No paywall)Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the inner-city property market could generally be understood in three words: fierce, competitive, and lucrative. ... [But now] it looks that a change may be appearing on the horizon. ... a shortage of tenants hasn’t worried everyone in the inner-city property market. The overwhelming tide away from the city fringes has left those still in the inner-city with largely unprecedented levels of purchasing power and leverage, whereby landlords typically desperate for property occupancy have been forced to negotiate better conditions and cheaper rents with prospective tenants. It’s a pattern that has been welcomed by CEO of the Tenants’ Union of NSW Leo Patterson Ross. ... Despite the growth in property vacancies and plunge in rental prices in the inner-city, Patterson Ross remains sceptical when discussing the true extent of power that tenants have been afforded throughout the past 12 months. “My test for a tenant’s market is one where the landlords are competing for the tenants to move in – they’re offering things like longer leases, pets by default, being really proactive about their maintenance, and we really didn’t see that, what we saw was the prices going down, but the real experience of renting in Sydney even in the middle of the CBD really didn’t change very much,” Patterson Ross said. “People were being offered basically the same deal, just a little bit less expensive.” (Inner West Independent)
https://cityhubsydney.com.au/2021/06/has-covid-induced-property-…
# TUNSW in the media NSW, Rent, Housing market, Landlords and agents.