6 days ago
Victorian government housing agency hires home-buyer as part of public housing demolition plans
The Victorian government's housing agency is hiring an internal home-buyer as it works to find new homes for residents displaced by its controversial plan to redevelop Melbourne's public housing towers.
The successful candidate will work with Homes Victoria to identify properties that are suitable for leasing or purchase, "including bulk and off-the-plan purchases".
They will also have a thorough understanding of the property market and transaction process, according to a job advertisement that closes tomorrow.
Homes Victoria regularly purchases and leases properties to add to the state's social housing stock, but the job ad's mention of a "high priority Tower Relocations program" suggests acquisitions could scale up as the 44 towers are progressively retired over the next 25 years.
While the move will likely help residents remain close to their existing communities, the government's critics say it could add more pressure to the strained property market.
"Our concern is the government obviously has absolutely no plan for how they are going to house 10,000 people that they are relocating in the middle of a housing crisis," the Victorian Greens' housing spokesperson, Gabrielle de Vietri, said.
"The government has said that it's simply too expensive for them to refurbish these public housing towers.
"Yet what they are engaging in is an incredibly expensive and inefficient process of buying up and head-leasing private homes to move public housing residents into."
The government has been under fire over the effect its plan to progressively redevelop the ageing towers, which generally house hundreds of people, will have on housing demand across the city.
It is unclear how many private market homes could be required over the life of the plan, with many tenants likely to be moved into existing social housing properties.
A Homes Victoria spokesperson declined to say how many private market homes would be required across the first three towers to be retired — in North Melbourne and Flemington — but the government has previously revealed four dwellings were leased and 16 dwellings purchased in surrounding suburbs in the first half of the year.
It is understood the homes were acquired at market value.
The Real Estate Institute of Victoria also said it was aware of a government initiative to purchase private dwellings for social housing, but its members had not reported any significant activity in that area.
"Increasing supply through new builds is the most effective way to address affordability and availability over the long term," a spokesperson said.
"However, we acknowledge that in some circumstances, the time frames associated with new developments may not meet urgent demand, and the use of existing stock may be a necessary interim measure."
Meanwhile, the Victorian Greens say they were recently contacted by a constituent claiming a real estate agency working on behalf of the government had approached multiple owners in their inner-west Melbourne apartment block about potential sales.
The movement comes as Melbourne's overburdened property market suffers from a citywide vacancy rate of 1.4 per cent, a near-record low according to property research body Cotality.
Head of research Tim Lawless said additional demand against this backdrop of low supply would generally place upward pressure on rents and property prices in the inner-city suburbs where the towers were located.
"I suppose from a positive perspective, it's good to see the state government looking after those tenants in government-owned properties and looking to relocate them," he said.
"I think the challenge is actually going to be finding enough housing to ensure those people have a quality lifestyle and a reasonable level of comfort."
The tower refurbishment plan is the focus of a current parliamentary inquiry that has heard evidence from distressed residents, legal centres and housing groups, as well as a resident-led class action that was dismissed but is currently being appealed.
However, the government argues the ageing towers have reached the end of their useful life and do not meet modern standards of design, comfort and energy efficiency.
It has promised to increase social housing by 10 per cent at each site when the estates are rebuilt, with a mix of social and private market housing.
More than 55,500 households were waiting to enter public housing in March this year, while a further 10,500 existing tenants had applied for transfers.
