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
The big banks could drop their variable rates much lower, but by how much?
David Taylor ABC (No paywall)Many Australians, towards the end of every month, face the sometimes daunting task of making repayments on their principal and interest variable rate home loan. Have you ever stopped and asked yourself how a bank works out what that variable rate should be?
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-12/variable-rates-and-why-yo…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.Melbourne property market in ‘catch-22’ as empty nesters dig in
Noel Towell The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Angela Lowe is happy in her South Yarra home and has no intention of moving anywhere. But Mrs Lowe’s choice, like that of tens of thousands of other “empty nesters” across Melbourne with no interest in downsizing from homes they have owned for decades, is increasingly contentious as the city’s real estate market heats to boiling point. Economists and the real estate industry warn massive increases in house prices seen this year are largely driven by a lack of desirable properties on the market. The large number of family-sized homes occupied by couples and singles from the baby boom generation is another big factor in the squeeze.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/melbourne-property-m…
# Australia, Home ownership, Housing market.No one cares
Daniel Hewitt (No paywall)From the United Kingdom ... If we had to sum up in a sentence how the tenants we have spoken to over the 3 months feel - the one phrase that comes up most: “No one cares.” (ITV)
https://twitter.com/DanielHewittITV/status/1402021710921089025
# Audio International, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Housing market.Borrowing to fund a land-lease community home comes of age
Rachel Lane The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)For retirees looking to move into a land-lease community – where you buy a home and lease the land on which it sits – borrowing can be expensive, if not almost impossible. Enter Land Lease Home Loans, a new financier headed up by Andrew Ralph, formerly of ANZ Health, which entered the market recently. The company provides loans of up to $400,000 for people wanting to downsize their existing home and move into a land-lease community. There are two main products available: (1) A principal-and-interest mortgage where borrowers can access up to 40 per cent of the value of the land-lease home over a maximum of 15 years, with an interest rate of between 4.95 per cent a year and 5.3 per cent, depending on the loan term. (2) A reverse mortgage which enables people over the age of 65 to borrow up to 15 per cent and those over 75 to borrow up to 25 per cent of the property value at an interest rate of 5.5 per cent a year, without the need to make a repayment until the property is sold.
https://www.smh.com.au/money/super-and-retirement/borrowing-to-f…
# Australia, Land lease communities.Millionaires who paid no tax and the richest and poorest postcodes revealed
Nassim Khadem and Michael Janda ABC (No paywall)Scroll down this article to "How are we earning the money?" Read on ... The number of landlords continued to edge higher to 2.24 million, and 58.6 per cent of them continued to lose money (excluding potential capital gains) — on average declaring a net rental loss of $1,352. However, that loss shrank from $1,623 the previous year when 60 per cent of landlords had greater expenses than rental income, and it is likely to have reduced further since then, as mortgage interest rates have fallen dramatically. The ATO's data suggest that, while rental deductions remained broadly the same as the previous financial year, landlords enjoyed a slight increase in rental income, narrowing their collective losses.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-08/tax-stats-ato-millionaire…
# Australia, Rent, Landlords and agents, Tax.Tenants allowed to keep pets and rent increases capped under MP’s plan
Felicity Caldwell The Sydney Morning Herald (Paywall)Tenants would be allowed to keep pets and rent increases would be capped under proposals from the Queensland Greens. ... Rental bidding, where two prospective tenants are pitted against each other and asked to offer the highest price, would be banned. And “no grounds” evictions, including when the owner wanted to sell the property, would be scrapped.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/queensland/tenants-allowed-to-ke…
# Australia, Eviction, Rent, No-grounds evictions, State Government.Solar micro-grid helping public-housing residents save money
Alexandra Alvaro ABC (No paywall)For many people like Carol Johansen, living on a budget is a fact of life. ... She is now living in one of five two-bedroom, local-council-operated, public-housing units in Nubeena, in southern Tasmania. The units are part of pilot program run by not-for-profit group Tasman Peninsula Power (TPP), which has set up what it says is the state's first micro-grid. ... A micro-grid is a small power network that can run independently of the state's main grid. Power generated by the network's solar panels goes either directly into the houses or into a nearby centralised battery for storage.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-06/solar-micro-grid-helping-…
# Australia, Public and community housing, Utilities water energy internet.Cut of £40m in help for tenants will ‘drive up homelessness’
Chaminda Jayanetti The Guardian (No paywall)From the United Kingdom ... The government is cutting the funding it gives to councils in England and Wales to help struggling tenants by more than a fifth, with critics warning the move will drive up homelessness following the recent end of the Covid evictions ban and the end of the furlough scheme in September. ... A spokesperson for tenants’ union Acorn said: “This cut to the DHP pot couldn’t come at a worse time. This will undoubtedly lead to more people needlessly ending up on the streets because they can’t pay their rent, and the emergency safety net that is supposed to help in this scenario will have been gutted.”
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/jun/06/cut-of-40m-in-help…
# International, Eviction, Rent, Coronavirus COVID-19, Homelessness.