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
Australian housing crisis: Rental advocate Jordan van den Lamb’s squatting campaign slammed
Brendan Casey realestate.com.au (No paywall)A controversial social media influencer who claims to be helping to fix the national housing crisis by encouraging the homeless people to squat in vacant homes has been slammed by a peak real estate body. Known as PurplePingers on TikTok and Instagram, Jordan van den Lamb has attracted an audience of nearly 250,000 followers across YouTube, Instagram and TikTok — and created a database of homes across Australia that have been vacant for at least two years.
https://www.realestate.com.au/news/australian-housing-crisis-ren…
# Hot topic Australia, Rent.Queensland's Sunshine Coast has 13,000 short-term lets but just 745 homes to rent. Are online platforms Stayz and Airbnb to blame?
Jessica Black ABC (No paywall)Aaron Webb's street has a dozen Airbnbs. He and his partner — a teacher at a local school — rent metres near the beach on Queensland's Sunshine Coast. In June, the region had 13,000 short-term stays but fewer than a thousand homes to rent, according to data from Queensland University and SQM Research. Mr Webb fears they'll be pushed out when their lease ends. It's what planner and social economist Peter Phibbs calls "the worst of both worlds" — a holiday destination with a year-round job market. Stayz corporate affairs director Eacham Curry calls it the "coal face".
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-12/sunshine-coast-housing-cr…
# Hot topic Australia, Rent.Should we make housing a human right?
Richelle Hunt ABC (No paywall)Currently there is no specific legal right to housing enshrined in the constitution or federal legislation in Australia. In his new book Housing: The Great Australian Right, former supreme court judge Kevin Bell argues the real estate market exists to create profit, when it should be set up to help people. In this episode, The Conversation Hour team explores what a new way forward might look like.
https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/theconversationhour/the-c…
# Hot topic, Audio Australia, .Builders going broke are hampering efforts to confront housing crisis
The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Sydney’s wretched housing crisis is one of the most difficult challenges facing NSW, but a major component in solving the problem – small to medium building companies – has been hampered by its own crisis. While plenty is being attempted to improve matters – the Minns government has promised a $5.1 billion housing package, moved to reduce impediments including slow-moving development applications, amended planning to permit medium rise near 30 train stations and warned reform opponents that NIMBYism was no longer tenable – failing building companies are now emerging as an unacknowledged threat to relieving the crisis.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/builders-going-broke-are-ham…
# Hot topic Australia, .NSW is ending 'no grounds' evictions: what does it mean for renters?
Jemima Mowbray Tenants' Union of NSW (No paywall)
The recent announcement by the NSW Government that they are moving ahead with promised eviction reforms is welcome news. For renters, and those who campaign for housing justice, this is long awaited reform. The reforms to end ‘no grounds’ evictions will mean renters will be provided with a genuine reason if they are being evicted. Doesn’t seem like such a big ask does it? And still we’ve been fighting 50 years to make it happen. More than a third of NSW now rents - more of these households are families with kids, and older renters, and more of them are renting for longer.
https://www.tenants.org.au/blog/nsw-ending-no-grounds-evictions-…
# Must read, Hot topic, TUNSW in the media, Research alert NSW, Eviction.Why premier feels he has no choice but to act on rental reform
Alexandra Smith The Sydney Morning Herald (No paywall)NSW Premier Chris Minns has warned that sweeping rental reforms are the only way to provide housing certainty to young people, who are fleeing Sydney and putting further pressure on small businesses that are struggling under the weight of the worsening worker shortage. The Minns government has committed to ending so-called no grounds evictions on fixed and periodic leases, which will see landlords banned from kicking out tenants without “commonsense and reasonable reasons”.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/why-premier-feels-he-has-no-…
# Hot topic NSW, .Vulnerable people living in Sydney boarding houses face eviction to make way for luxury apartments
Holly Tregenza ABC (No paywall)On a street in Sydney's wealthiest council area, Stephen Deer is one of 32 residents living at a boarding house which has been a refuge for low-income earners since the end of World War II. But a development proposal could end the 70-year-old's "absolutely joyful" decade living at Selwyn Street in Paddington. Mr Deer and his "family" of other boarding house residents, some of whom have lived there for more than 50 years, stare down eviction and potential homelessness.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-08-08/nsw-boarding-house-closur…
# Must read NSW, Boarders and lodgers, Eviction.NSW treasurer takes time out from housing crisis to buy $4m house
Lucy Macken The Sydney Morning Herald (No paywall)NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey handed down his second budget earlier this year, addressing the housing crisis by rolling out the biggest investment in public housing in the state’s history. Job done, he went home and started packing boxes ahead of his own home upgrade. The Labor man, son of Indian migrants, has not only done well professionally since growing up in Merrylands, but he has also succeeded in the property stakes, judging by his recent purchase of one of Stanmore’s grandest residences.
https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/nsw-treasurer-takes-time-ou…
# Hot topic NSW, .