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
Stamp duty tax adds an unexpected extra billion to NSW budget
Ashleigh Raper ABC (No paywall)Sydney's booming property market has resulted in the state government collecting $1 billion more than expected in stamp duty revenue. ... But the better than expected result in 2020-21 hasn't changed the Treasurer's mind that stamp duty should be scrapped. "While stamp duty might be the number one revenue source the New South Wales budget receives," Mr Perrottet said. "It doesn't make it good tax."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-20/stamp-duty-adds-9-379-bil…
# NSW, Housing market, State Government, Tax.Watchdog investigates concerns tenants are being hit with fees to pay rent
Henrietta Cook The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Victoria’s consumer watchdog is investigating complaints that real estate agents are forcing tenants to fork out extra fees to pay their rent. An increasing number of real estate agents have outsourced the processing of rental payments to third-party companies, and tenants are charged a fee to use these services.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/victoria/watchdog-investigates-c…
# Australia, Rent, Landlords and agents.Australian nightmare looms even as Frydenberg prepares his election pitch
Peter Hartcher The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)This is a generational betrayal. Every Australian in my generation or older who thinks he or she is a brilliant investor because of fat housing price profits is simply a participant in the betrayal of the next generation. Why? Home ownership is now out of reach for Australians under the age of 35, according to a new report from the University of NSW City Futures Research Centre. Seventy per cent of all housing wealth in Australia is now concentrated in the hands of the over 65s. ... So if you were aged 21 to 35, and earning the national average income for people in your age group – $58,635 a year – the price of a Sydney house was rising every day by an amount equal to one week’s wages. The message to average Australians is to despair of being able to do what your parents very likely did – buy a home. What a brilliant national achievement. We’ve priced the next generation out of the ability to buy a home. We have only 26 million people inhabiting an entire continent but cannot supply affordable housing in our major cities. ... Australian inequality will never be as bad as America’s. Not so long as we have policies like Medicare, the NDIS, and a compulsory superannuation levy. But if wages continue to stagnate while asset prices soar, inequality will tear at the social fabric.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/australian-nightmare-looms-even-…
# Australia, Federal Government, Home ownership, Housing market.Preventing a Covid rent arrears crisis: financial support package for renters
(No paywall)From the United Kingdom ... Joint briefing by housing and advice organisations ... The following [nine recommendations] sets out how a package of grants and no-interest loans could be provided in England, to sustain tenancies and act as a bridge to recovery.
https://www.stepchange.org/Portals/0/assets/pdf/Covid-Rent-Arrea…
# International, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19.'Hold on to that hatred’: Boomers aren’t to blame for Australia’s property mismatch
Liz Allen The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Baby Boomers are often blamed for Australia’s housing affordability crisis, but empty-nesters living in large homes are just a symptom of Australia’s property and policy mismatch. Rather than dampen housing prices, COVID has seen costs soar. In fact, the growth in house prices doesn’t look like abating. The great Australian dream of owning a home is out of reach for many Australians, especially those under 40, and will remain that way without drastic policy action. ... Blaming Baby Boomers for Australia’s housing mismatch seems logical, but it’s lazy and simplistic. The reality is, Australia’s housing policies are an out-of-date mess, like a ball of decaying rubber bands wrapped together and stuffed in the bottom drawer of the office filing cabinet. Try to untangle the policy nightmare and more failures are exposed. Negative gearing isn’t helping first homebuyers, but voters missed the opportunity of changing this at the 2018 federal election and we’ve not seen much done since to arrest rising house prices. Without serious and earnest reform, housing affordability will worsen and inequality will widen and become more stubborn. The generational warfare in housing policy is politically useful. While we’re quibbling about which generation is at fault, politicians are getting off scot-free.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/hold-on-to-that-hatred-b…
# Australia, Coronavirus COVID-19, Federal Government, Home ownership, Housing affordability, Housing market, Tax.Auckland, Wellington tenants endure relentless rent rises
Chris McDowall and Anne Gibson (No paywall)Auckland edges Wellington as the most expensive city in New Zealand for tenants - but rents in the capital have risen more in real terms since 2000. Auckland rents up 45%, Wellington up 53%. (New Zealand Herald)
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/auckland-wellington-tenants-…
# International, Rent, Housing market.Public housing's failing so how do we fix it?
Lexi Metherell ABC (No paywall)Until around the 1980s, public housing was considered a mainstream option for low incomes, but now, there's really only enough places available for the most marginalised, such is the shortfall of public housing dwellings. It's widely agreed the system is broken. There are solutions on the horizon, but they need political will and creative thinking from investors. (The World Today)
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/adelaide/programs/worldtoday/public…
# Audio Australia, Public and community housing.How capitalism is reshaping cities (literally)
Nate Berg (No paywall)The very, very short explanation of the cause and effect of the 2008 financial crisis can be summarized in two words: real estate. Risky mortgages traded like stocks were blown into a bubble that popped, ravaging the finances and savings of people all around the world. In the aftermath, institutional investors bought up swathes of foreclosed properties, and pushed the financialization of housing into hyper-speed. [Read on] (Fast Market)
https://www.fastcompany.com/90637385/how-capitalism-is-reshaping…
# International, Housing market.