Latest news with #RealEstateInstitute
Daily Mail
13 hours ago
- General
- Daily Mail
Major victory for renters after hated rule is revoked for millions of Aussies
Renters in Tasmania will no longer need to pay to get their carpets professionally cleaned when vacating a rental following a court battle over a 'small yellow stain'. A 'blanket' clause requiring tenants to get their carpets cleaned at the end of a lease was previously commonplace in contracts for rentals in Tasmania. It had not been legally tested but was protected by the Real Estate Institute of Tasmania (REIT) until a court dispute saw the clause recently overruled. The Residential Tenancy Commission (RTC) ruled carpets would only have to be professionally cleaned at the expense of the exiting tenant if they were found to be in a worse condition than they were at the start of the lease. The ruling came after the Tenants Union of Tasmania (TUT) represented a renter from Burnie, on the island's north coast, after part of their bond was withheld in order to pay for all the carpets in their rental to be professionally cleaned. It came after their landlord found a 'small yellow stain' on the bedroom carpet. The stain had not been recorded in the condition report and no other photos were supplied of any damage to the other carpets in the home. The RTC found the tenant was only responsible for the cost of cleaning the single stain and awarded their landlord $25 for cleaning. 'I will award an amount I consider reasonable given the stain in question is very small, even when photographed close up,' the ruling stated. 'The owner is awarded $25 for carpet cleaning.' The RTC went even further, declaring tenants will no longer have to pay for professional carpet cleaning at the end of a residential tenancy. 'A tenant is not responsible for carpet cleaning performed as a matter of general practice as opposed to any real need or genuine failure of the tenant, in accordance with their obligations,' the commission ruled. Tenants Union senior solicitor Andrew Smith told the ABC the ruling made the 'blanket clause' requiring carpets to be professionally cleaned 'invalid'. 'A tenant has the right not to do it, if they've left it in the same condition as when they moved in and there's proof of that,' he said. 'So as always, tenants should take their own photos when moving in and carefully make any notes in any condition reports they (are) provided.'
ABC News
27-05-2025
- Business
- ABC News
Spike in 'sophisticated' social media scams targeting would-be renters in WA
When Lorenzo Pietribiasi moved to Broome from Italy, he bounced around living with friends and in staff accommodation before braving the rental market. He spent over a month trying to find a rental but said part of the problem was scammers on social media. "It's frustrating … you have to work or do other stuff, and you're trying to sort out where you're going to sleep for the next month," Mr Pietribiasi said. Mr Pietribiasi said he was contacted by four separate scammers while trying to secure a property in the northern WA town. "I did the normal procedure like everyone does — I went on Facebook and in all the groups started posting that I'm looking for a place," he said. "But no real people were contacting me, it was mainly scams." Mr Pietribiasi said he would receive direct messages on Facebook asking him to disclose personal information before letting him view the property. When he pushed back, they either went silent or gave "more excuses". In other instances, "scam links" were left in comments under his posts. The ABC spoke with the facilitator of a Broome rental page, who said they used certain technology to automatically block scam posts and comments on prospective tenants' profiles. On some rental group pages, there are upwards of 10 third-party link comments underneath posts. The Real Estate Institute of WA's latest quarterly report showed average weekly rents in Broome had reached $1,000 per week, representing an 11.1 per cent increase in three months. Rental scamming is "exacerbated" in regional areas like Broome, according to lawyer Alice Pennycott from Making Renting Fair WA. Ms Pennycott said people locked out of finding a rental through "traditional" means like a realtor often turned to online platforms, which were unregulated and "more rogue". "New ways of scamming people have emerged … they [scams] can look quite sophisticated now. It can be hard to tell that it isn't legit," she said. "It's alarming seeing people unable to access properties through … more traditional means." Ms Pennycott said prospective renters were made vulnerable by a "power imbalance between tenants and landlords". "People are often asked to give a lot of personal and confidential information to apply for a rental property, like bank statements and details of employment," she said. Make Renting Fair WA has called for tighter regulation around tenancy applications so renters are protected regardless of what the market is doing. Source: Consumer Protection Kimberley-based Consumer Protection senior officer Ange Inns said the agency was trying to arm people with knowledge to help them avoid scams. She said there had been an increase in rental scams, and the current market made it especially hard for people under financial pressure, who urgently needed a home. "They're posting fake photos and making the property look great, and the rental price is often too good to be true — so these are red flags." Prospective tenants should view the property before providing identification documents or transferring bank funds, according to Ms Inns. Consumer Protection encouraged anyone who may have encountered a rental scam to report it immediately to help the state agency track fraudulent activity and prevent others from falling victim.
News.com.au
20-05-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
Victorian budget panned as a ‘kick in the guts' to first-home buyers and a ‘chokehold' on property sector
The Victorian budget has been lashed as a 'kick in the guts' to first-home buyers after it slammed the door on a key housing program despite forecasts of a property price surge. Real Estate Institute of Victoria president Jacob Caine criticised the lack of support for first-home buyers in a budget that openly acknowledged home prices are expected to rise, even as it signalled the end of the once popular Victorian Homebuyer Fund. 'If you are a first-home buyer or on the cusp, it must feel like a kick in the guts,' Mr Caine said. 'It appears that the government is simultaneously relying on the extension of the stamp duty discount for new builds and the incentives and support program that the feds have promised, to shirk their responsibility for supporting first-home buyers into their first home. 'The forecast of increased Victorian property prices aligns with most economist and industry pundits, and that says that the opportunity to buy a first home is going to become even more difficult than it already is. 'The government needs to do more to support young Victorians into their first home.' In last year's budget the Victorian Homebuyer Fund shared-equity scheme was slated to exit the state's selection of support programs for affordability-challenged home buyers as of June 30, 2025. Yesterday's budget had no mention of the scheme, which is believed to have helped close to 15,000 Victorians with even a 5 per cent deposit to buy a home with the government paying for up to 25 per cent of its cost in return for a commensurate stake in the property. With no further funding, the state's struggling homebuyers will be directed towards a similar federal scheme dubbed Help To Buy — however that program's start date is still listed as late 2025. The Albanese government announced extensions to its property price caps, now $950,000 in metropolitan areas and $650,000 in regional areas, and the income eligibilities for it in the lead up to this year's federal election. But the number of places has not shifted from 40,000 over four years. At 10,000 per annum, Victorians would have to claim about 4000 of the national total, or 40 per cent, in order to get the same number of recipients as the state scheme. The REIV had called for the state government to follow the federal government's lead by boosting caps on the stamp duty concession scheme for first-home buyers which have remained at $600,000 for a full waiver, and $750,000 for a discounted tax bill, since 2017. State Revenue Office figures show 41,793 Victorian first-home buyers used the scheme in the 2023-2024 financial year, meaning it is helping more than 10 times the numbers likely to be assisted by the federal scheme. However, those numbers are waining as the caps cover an increasingly small portion of the market. At its peakin the 2020-2021 fianancial year, the program assisted almost 54,000 Victorians. They had also sought a more balanced property tax obligations, another budget submission Mr Caine said was ignored despite mounting evidence that landlords were selling up faster than they were being replaced. 'These declines should sound alarm bells, as they reflect a tightening rental market and reduced property investment, just when we need more rental housing, not less,' he said. 'With investor confidence fading, maintaining the budgetary status quo risks further constraining housing supply and worsening affordability issues.' Property Council of Australia Victorian executive director Cath Evans said the budget had left the property sector caught in a 'chokehold' of government fees, costs and charges that were stifling investment. 'The industry was hoping for progress – instead, we've hit a stop sign,' Ms Evans said. 'Since last year's budget, we have been loudly advocating for an easing of the tax burden to promote investment, greater support for first homebuyers and feasibility solutions to increase supply. None of this was addressed in the budget. 'The industry is ready to grow, but it can't grow under the current arrangements.' Housing Industry Association executive director Keith Ryan panned the budget as a bid for re-election that had failed to deliver meaningful and needed tax reform for the property sector. 'Trading conditions for many new home builders have become increasingly precarious in the face of overreaching new regulations, poor consumer confidence and escalating construction costs – many of which have been compounded by Victoria's punitive property tax regime,' Mr Ryan said. 'Unfortunately, this year's budget does little to reduce the prohibitive cost of new home building, apart from the previously foreshadowed decision to extend the stamp duty concession for off-the-plan apartments, units and townhouses for a further 12 months.' He said the one glimmer of hope for first-home buyers was a boost to VLine train services, which could potentially make affordable homes in regional parts of the state more viable for market entrants. Master Builders Victoria chief executive Michaela Lihou said they appreciated a conservative approach, and lauded $50m for the Melbourne Polytechnic Future of Housing Construction TAFE Centre of Excellence. However, Ms Lihou said broader building industry stimulus had been needed. 'While the significant shortage of housing in Victoria has also been a primary focus for the past few years now, we had hoped the Government would have seen the value in a significant stimulus injection to get the industry and homes moving for deserving Victorians,' she said.
Scoop
17-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Is It Actually A Good Time To Buy A House?
Twice this week, first-home buyers have been told that now might be their big chance to get into the housing market. First, QV said a lull in property values was giving first-time buyers a 'rare opportunity'. Then, the Real Estate Institute acting chief executive Rowan Dixon suggested that, if first-home buyers were looking for a chance to get into the property market, it was a good time to do so. 'There is still plenty of stock there, particularly in the main centres, good pricing and low interest rates… if people can get into the market for their first home now is a good time to do it before maybe things start to pick up a bit more.' But just how great an opportunity is it, really? RNZ looked at a number of factors that could help answer that question. Interest rates Interest rates have fallen significantly, which helps to make the prospect of servicing a mortgage a bit more palatable. From a peak of about 7 percent, two-year home loan fixes are now about 5 percent. That means, for a typical first home mortgage of $567,448, the weekly repayment would be about $700. That's still about $60 more than the national average rental rate. Usually, falling interest rates push up house prices but that hasn't happened to a significant degree yet. 'There's a window where financing is cheaper but it hasn't quite flowed through to house prices as it might have done historically,' Corelogic chief property economist Kelvin Davidson said. Brad Olsen, chief executive at Infometrics, said rates were not expected to get back to the 2 percent levels seen through the Covid times. 'Interest rates are down but to more usual long-term levels.' House prices Nationally, house prices are still down about 15 percent from the peak, although they are still up 4 percent a year compared to five years ago. Wellington's prices are furthest from the peak, still down more than 25 percent, Auckland's are down 21.6 percent. But all prices are still higher than five years ago. Earlier data from Corelogic showed they were the areas that had the largest affordability improvements, bringing them close to long-term averages. Places like Queenstown and Christchurch are a bit of an outlier – Canterbury is now just 3.2 percent below the peak and Southland has already exceeded it 'Houses are more affordable than they were,' Davidson said. 'I still wouldn't say they are affordable as such – they're cheaper, but not necessarily cheap. But are house prices really going to fall significantly further from here? It seems unlikely. They'll probably turn around and rise a bit. There's a sense now that they're as cheap as they're going to be even if they're not necessarily cheap.' KiwiSaver Some buyers' KiwiSaver accounts may have taken a hit through the start of this year due to market volatility. Most of those could have shown signs of recovery over the past week. Davidson said it was likely that people who were planning to buy in the near term had already shifted their money to conservative funds before the wobbles hit. Stock on the market Buyers have a lot of choice at the moment, which gives them the upper hand. In a buyers' market, they can take their time over their decisions and know they have a lot of options. says the amount of stock for sale was up 6.2 percent year-on-year in April. Olsen said that meant buyers could bargain for a lower price and play sellers off against each other. 'If you want to get a sale and a possible buyer knows there is probably another house for sale down the road you'll be doing a fair bit to make sure your house gets sold.' Rent But it's actually a good time to be a renter, too. There is also a lot of rental stock on the market in lots of parts of the country, and advertised rents are dropping. The picture isn't consistent across the entire country but it's taking longer than normal to rent in most places with the exception of parts of Canterbury and Hawke's Bay. 'You could make a case of why rush into it when you could get a good deal on a rental for a while and you're probably not going to get left behind by the housing market in the meantime,' Davidson said. 'In general terms renting is always cheaper than buying so nothing has really changed there… if you stuck to that line of argument no one would ever buy a house.' The job market Buying a house usually means you need to have reliable income. While the worst might be nearly over for the labour market, it's likely to be weak for a while to come, which could mean job losses are more likely and it could be harder to find a new job if you are unemployed. Anyone who is worried about their job security might hesitate about buying a house. 'They might be able to afford the house at the moment but not if they lost their job and couldn't find a new one,' Olsen said. The other stuff Davidson said you could argue that it's 'always a good time to be a first-home buyer'. 'In the sense that if you want to buy a house, like the house, like the location, you're secure in your job and you want security of tenure and you can secure the finance, you're going to be there for the long-term why wait?' He said for many first-home buyers the decision was more than financial. 'They're setting up a family base.' He said if people looked for negatives they would probably never do anything. 'There are always pros and cons but if we're asking a binary question, is it a good time to buy, yes or no, I would have to say yes.' Olsen said he was always worried when people said buyers should 'rush in'. 'It comes across as scarcity marketing to scare people into rushing into buying. Buyers definitely have a good opportunity at the moment, that is true. But I think they should keep their wits about them, look at what's out there and how much they can afford, run some scenarios on what they could afford if things changed around mortgage rates or their job.'
1News
16-05-2025
- Business
- 1News
Is it actually a good time to buy a house?
Twice this week, first-home buyers have been told that now might be their big chance to get into the housing market. First, QV said a lull in property values was giving first-time buyers a "rare opportunity". Then, the Real Estate Institute acting chief executive Rowan Dixon suggested that, if first-home buyers were looking for a chance to get into the property market, it was a good time to do so. "There is still plenty of stock there, particularly in the main centres, good pricing and low interest rates… if people can get into the market for their first home now is a good time to do it before maybe things start to pick up a bit more." But just how great an opportunity is it, really? RNZ looked at a number of factors that could help answer that question. Interest rates have fallen significantly, which helps to make the prospect of servicing a mortgage a bit more palatable. From a peak of about 7%, two-year home loan fixes are now about 5%. That means, for a typical first home mortgage of $567,448, the weekly repayment would be about $700. That's still about $60 more than the national average rental rate. Usually, falling interest rates push up house prices, but that hasn't happened to a significant degree yet. "There's a window where financing is cheaper but it hasn't quite flowed through to house prices as it might have done historically," Corelogic chief property economist Kelvin Davidson said. Brad Olsen, chief executive at Infometrics, said rates were not expected to get back to the 2% levels seen through the Covid times. "Interest rates are down but to more usual long-term levels." Nationally, house prices are still down about 15% from the peak, although they are still up 4% compared to five years ago. Wellington's prices are furthest from the peak, still down more than 25%, Auckland's are down 21.6%. Auckland prices are now just 2.2% higher than they were five years ago. Wellington's are 1.5% higher. Earlier data from Corelogic showed they were the areas that had the largest affordability improvements, bringing them close to long-term averages. Places like Queenstown are a bit of an outlier, still up 9.1% on five years ago, and Christchurch is up 8.3%. "Houses are more affordable than they were," Davidson said. "I still wouldn't say they are affordable as such - they're cheaper, but not necessarily cheap. But are house prices really going to fall significantly further from here? It seems unlikely. They'll probably turn around and rise a bit. There's a sense now that they're as cheap as they're going to be even if they're not necessarily cheap." Some buyers' KiwiSaver accounts may have taken a hit through the start of this year due to market volatility. Most of those could have shown signs of recovery over the past week. Davidson said it was likely that people who were planning to buy in the near term had already shifted their money to conservative funds before the wobbles hit. Buyers have a lot of choice at the moment, which gives them the upper hand. In a buyers' market, they can take their time over their decisions and know they have a lot of options. says the amount of stock for sale was up 6.2% year-on-year in April. Olsen said that meant buyers could bargain for a lower price and play sellers off against each other. "If you want to get a sale and a possible buyer knows there is probably another house for sale down the road you'll be doing a fair bit to make sure your house gets sold." But it's actually a good time to be a renter, too. There is also a lot of rental stock on the market in lots of parts of the country, and advertised rents are dropping. The picture isn't consistent across the entire country but it's taking longer than normal to rent in most places with the exception of parts of Canterbury and Hawke's Bay. "You could make a case of why rush into it when you could get a good deal on a rental for a while and you're probably not going to get left behind by the housing market in the meantime," Davidson said. "In general terms renting is always cheaper than buying so nothing has really changed there… if you stuck to that line of argument no one would ever buy a house." Buying a house usually means you need to have reliable income. While the worst might be nearly over for the labour market, it's likely to be weak for a while to come, which could mean job losses are more likely and it could be harder to find a new job if you are unemployed. Anyone who is worried about their job security might hesitate about buying a house. "They might be able to afford the house at the moment but not if they lost their job and couldn't find a new one," Olsen said. Davidson said you could argue that it's "always a good time to be a first-home buyer". "In the sense that if you want to buy a house, like the house, like the location, you're secure in your job and you want security of tenure and you can secure the finance, you're going to be there for the long-term why wait?" He said for many first-home buyers the decision was more than financial. "They're setting up a family base." He said if people looked for negatives they would probably never do anything. "There are always pros and cons but if we're asking a binary question, is it a good time to buy, yes or no, I would have to say yes." Olsen said he was always worried when people said buyers should "rush in". "It comes across as scarcity marketing to scare people into rushing into buying. Buyers definitely have a good opportunity at the moment, that is true. But I think they should keep their wits about them, look at what's out there and how much they can afford, run some scenarios on what they could afford if things changed around mortgage rates or their job."
