Australia's tight rental market forces tenants to make tough choices

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Australia's red-hot rental housing market, supercharged by record migration and a chronic supply shortage, could be reaching a breaking point for affordability as tenants grapple with rising costs of living.

Nationwide vacancies are at all-time lows and prices are up 30% over three years, forcing renters like Sydney office worker Lara Weeks into unenviable situations.

That in turn would push up the variable rate mortgages held by most Australian landlords who are typically private investors with one or a few properties rather than large corporations, pressuring them to lift rents further and forcing tenants to make tough decisions. Apartment rents nationally jumped 4% during the quarter, double the June quarter rate of increase, to an average of A$520 per week, making them almost as costly.

Rent inflation is expected to peak at an annual rate of 10% in the next few quarters before easing, Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Michele Bullock said at a Senate hearing on Thursday."Compared with the beginning of the year, it's way quieter now," said Christian Postiglione, an agent in Sydney's expensive eastern suburbs, which include Bondi Beach. "We would have 40 to 50 groups per inspection around January and February... the volume is very kind of low now.

 

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