Just a friendly reminder that tenancy laws changed heavily in favour of tenants in Victoria as of July 2020. I see a lot of factually incorrect posts online that talk about renters's rights in national terms.

The law varies massively between states. But in Vic, now, tenants have rights closer to those of tenants in Germany than NSW.

You can have pets, hang photos and even make changes to the property as long as you do not negatively impact the value of the rental property.

We are still in the period where REAs and Landlords are trying to take advantage of tenants who are not across these changes. And as a result VCAT is backed up something fierce.

But if you're renting in VIC, and something doesn't seem right, contact the tenant's union and get advice. You have more rights nowadays than you know. I've leveraged the new regs multiple times already. One of the best aspects is that if the landlord/REA decides to carry out some sort of retribution for you exercising your rights, that is punishable as well with compensation paid to the tenant.

So don't be afraid to reach out if you are experiencing harrassment or dodgy behaviour from your landlord or REA if you're in Victoria.

#housingreform #rentalcrisis #victoria

@yana incredible article. Heartbreaking as well. It ties something abstract like housing safety and landlord accountability to something very human and real. The story of the children’s mother, what a difficult story. But one that needs to heard. Thank you for sharing this. #ProtectThePeople #HousingFraud #TenantRights #HousingReform

@pluralistic On housing, Shane Phillips is doing some novel and powerful work at UCLA's Lewis Centre.

I ran across his proposal for "public ownership rentals" in The Atlantic

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/03/why-its-better-to-rent-than-to-own/618254/

That's actually one leg of a three-legged stool of Supply, Security, and Subsidy, which addressess the three main areas of housing market failure. His book is The Affordable City, a very affordable $5 download:
https://islandpress.org/books/affordable-city

Great Twitter feed as well:
https://twitter.com/ShaneDPhillips/

https://www.lewis.ucla.edu/

#Housing #HousingReform #LewisCenter #ShanePhillips #TheAffordableCity