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
Rent arrears put thousands at risk as end of eviction ban in England looms
Hilary Osborne The Guardian (No paywall)From the United Kingdom ... Clare Austin and family live in a privately rented house in Hertfordshire. She and her husband could afford the monthly rent of £1,700 when they were both working but when he lost his job a couple of years ago, they fell behind with their payments. He got another job and things were almost back on track when Covid hit and both were furloughed. “We can’t claim anything as we’re furloughed, but my husband is a salesman and only getting 80% of his basic pay,” said Austin, who works for a travel company. “My biggest concern is the rent arrears.” The couple owe their landlord more than £3,000. Despite the ban on evictions until the end of May, he has been threatening to ask them to leave.
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/may/08/rent-arrears-put-t…
# Hot topic International, Eviction, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Housing market.Housing affordability crisis: Could tiny towns of tiny homes in caravan parks help?
Sue Williams Domain (No paywall)Australia may have fallen in love with tiny houses, but could tiny towns of tiny houses help provide a solution to the country’s crippling home affordability crisis? One developer is currently buying up old caravan parks in Victoria – with plans to expand into other states – and replacing older caravans with architect-designed, newly made tiny houses in the overhauled, reconfigured parks. At the same time, a construction company is planning a pop-up rural village of tiny homes in an experiment being put to councils along the east coast of NSW as homes for young people, retirees on fixed incomes and those in need of cheaper housing. ... [But] Urban planner Peter Phibbs of the University of Sydney’s School of Architecture, Design and Planning said his main concerns lay with the security of tenure of residents.
https://www.domain.com.au/news/housing-affordability-crisis-coul…
# Australia, Land lease communities, Affordable housing, Homelessness, Housing market, Planning and development.Factoring in reality
The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Scroll down to this Letter to the Editor: The editorial heralding the present housing market as “a welcome sign of return to normal” underplays the dramatic implications of the situation (“Home prices rises a welcome sign of return to normal”, May 8-9). It means that millions of Australians will be long-term or even life-long renters subject to all the vagaries of the insecure rental market. Many of those who manage to purchase will be in mortgage stress and constantly concerned about the possibility of an interest rate rise. More broadly, the increase will accentuate inequality between those who have (or whose parents have) the disposable income required for a deposit and those who don’t.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/changing-story-betrays-pm-s-…
# Must read Australia, Rent, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market.Stamp duty for land value tax
Cameron K Murray (No paywall)The NSW government is proposing to give homebuyers the option to not pay stamp duty on their housing purchase and instead opt to pay an ongoing land value tax. I have labelled such policies SD4LVT. SD4LVT seems to be motivated by "bad economics". All the efficiency gains that economic analysts claim will occur are merely assumptions and not very realistic ones at that. ... The question of whether SD4LVT is a good policy change depends not on the price effects—it merely redistributes who gets what payment and when—but on efficiency effects from making housing turnover cheaper. ... In general, if you want to reallocate the economic rents that have accumulated to landowners, then a land value tax is a good way to go. But you do not need to remove another tax that achieves the same thing. Both taxes can work well together to divert economic rents from landowner to the public. (Fresh Economic Thinking)
https://www.fresheconomicthinking.com/2021/05/stamp-duty-for-lan…
# NSW, Home ownership, Housing market, State Government, Tax.Building safety, planning and renters reform plans confirmed in Queen’s Speech
Dominic Brady Inside Housing (Paywall)From the United Kingdom ... A briefing document on the measures included a reference to a Renters Reform Bill. It said the government will publish a consultation response on banning ’no fault’ evictions under this bill later this year. This policy was first announced in April 2019. It also said it will “explore the merits of a landlord register” and publish a white paper in the autumn detailing its reforms with legislation to follow “in due course”.
https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/news/building-safety-planni…
# International, Eviction, Public and community housing, Rent, Housing market, No-grounds evictions.Medical professionals fear debilitating mould-related illnesses go undiagnosed, call for further research
Steve Vivian ABC (No paywall)For nearly three years, Sue Phoo didn't know why her health was unravelling. ... But in 2016, Ms Phoo was suffering from extreme fatigue, depression, respiratory issues, a lack of concentration and no one could work out why. ... Ms Phoo's dietician, Richard Sager, told her she might have a biotoxin illness known as chronic inflammatory response syndrome (CIRS). "CIRS, which is often associated with water-damaged buildings where you get this exposure to mould, means your immune system is not genetically able to get rid of the toxins that have accumulated in your body," Mr Sager said. [Read on ...]
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-12/severe-mould-illnesses-ci…
# Australia, Health, Mould.Social housing, homeless left out in the cold
Michael Fotheringham The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)As Australia navigates social and economic recoveries from COVID-19, housing markets across the country are showing strain. House prices are surging across the nation, and rental vacancies are at record lows. No single policy intervention will provide a silver bullet to solve Australia’s housing affordability and availability challenges – a concerted and co-ordinated strategy would be required, and housing is not a major focus of this Budget.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/social-housing-homeless-left-out…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Rent, Federal Government, Homelessness.How to cool the housing market is a pet subject
Alan Kohler The New Daily (No paywall)The well-meaning efforts of the federal government to help people buy a house will only make matters worse. ... A more lasting solution would be to make long-term tenancy more appealing and leases longer in this country, as they are in Europe, and at the same time encourage developers and their financiers to build apartments to rent, rather than sell to individual landlords. To get a little specific, one of the reasons for the Australian obsession with home ownership is that it’s the only way for many people to own a dog or cat. New Victorian tenancy laws force landlords to allow pets, along with a number of other pro-tenant provisions. But that’s just in Victoria and it has only just been passed, so it will take a while to sink in. Everywhere else in Australia, the landlord still rules the roost. So it’s not so much that Australians have an obsession with home ownership, but the perfectly natural obsession with having a pet. So one way to permanently take the heat out of the property market would be for other states to copy the new Victorian laws, and shift the balance of power in the system away from landlords and towards tenants.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/2021/05/10/alan-kohler-housin…
# Australia, Rent, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market.