Australians struggling to pay their rent are unlikely to get any immediate respite from the Albanian government when it issues its budget on Tuesday.
The average weekly rent for Sydneysiders currently stands at $770 per week, while in Melbourne it is $589, according to Core Logic.
Australians have been struggling to keep up with rent payments or even find somewhere to live, with queues stretching hundreds of meters for open houses.
The average weekly rent for properties across Australia is now an all-time high of $627, with rental vacancies at less than one per cent in capital cities.
Maiy Azize, spokesperson for housing crisis campaign group Everybody’s Home, said the government should try to impose limits on rent increases, as other countries have done.
His comment comes as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese addressed the Budget on Tuesday promising cost of living relief would be delivered to millions of Australians.
Australians struggling to pay their rent are unlikely to get an immediate reprieve from the government when it delivers its budget on Tuesday (pictured, a crowd queuing for an inspection of a rental home in Bondi)
“Australia is an outlier,” Azize said news.com.au.
“We are seeing the impacts of sharp increases in rental prices and therefore if the government wanted to offer some immediate relief it could support caps and work with state and territory ministers to achieve this.”
Seven in 10 Australians experience rental stress, InfoChoice’s January 2024 rental crisis survey reported.
Of about 1,000 tenants surveyed, 40 percent said their rent had skyrocketed by 10 percent, and many now fear they will have to move soon.
Albanese told 3AW on Tuesday that Australians will wake up tomorrow morning to a raft of financial benefits delivered by the Budget.
“They will wake up knowing that if they are taxpayers, they will receive a tax cut on July 1,” he said.
‘They will wake up knowing if they are students with $3 billion in tax debt.
‘If they are doing a course to become a teacher or nurse, they will be paid for their practice.
‘They know that the government now has 32 billion dollars of investment in housing; that we are investing in infrastructure; that will have a greater number of urgent care clinics… and the government has a plan to do more things here.’
Ahead of the budget, Albanese announced a five-year, $9.3 billion National Deal on social housing and homelessness for states and territories to tackle homelessness, build social housing and provide crisis support .
The Labor Party is delivering on its promise to build 1.2 million homes in five years, but achieving this requires building 240,000 homes a year.
Last year, just 168,690 new homes were built, despite a record 548,800 net new migrants moving to Australia in the year to September.
At 2.5 people per household, on average, that leaves a shortfall of more than 127,000 new homes to cater for new permanent and long-term arrivals abroad, even before births are taken into account.
The Albanian government has also invested $25 billion in new housing developments over the next decade, including $2 billion for more social and affordable rental housing.
But Azize said there was now a need to provide more relief to struggling Australians.
‘People are making it really difficult. “They just can’t keep up with these rent increases,” he said.
There have also been calls to increase the JobSeeker payment.
Last year, the government increased the Commonwealth Rental Assistance payment by 15 per cent.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers to deliver budget Tuesday
The payment helps vulnerable Australians by providing those eligible with a non-taxable income supplement.
Charmaine Crowe, social security program manager at the Australian Council of Social Services, said the JobSeeker payment was due to rise with it.
He said less than half of JobSeeker users qualified for the rental assistance payment.
“Even if rental assistance were increased, without a substantial increase in the base rate for JobSeeker and related payments, it would probably do little to reduce rental stress because JobSeeker and Youth Allowance are so low,” he told the publication.
Australia’s rental crisis has gotten so bad that an international student is looking for people to share a bed with and contribute to his weekly rent.
Belgian student William Vanneste, 22, lives in a two-bedroom house in Lane Cove, on Sydney’s lower north shore, while he completes a three-month internship.
Mr. Vanneste lived in the furnished apartment with two Frenchmen who decided to share a bed and cut their share of the $1,150 weekly rent in half.
The recent departure of the students has left Mr. Vanneste in the difficult situation of finding someone to fill the vacancy and share a bed with a complete stranger.
Charmaine Crowe, social security program manager at the Australian Council of Social Services, said the JobSeeker payment needed to be increased (file image)
He announced the unusual housing conditions in a Facebook post explaining that there were only two beds available.
“So the likelihood that you’ll end up sharing your bed is very high, but they’re very big and we respect privacy, so if you don’t mind, you’re welcome!” he wrote.
“If necessary, we can buy an inflatable mattress for one of us.”
Rents are rising fastest in areas between 30 and 40 kilometers from city centers, CoreLogic head of research Eliza Owen reported.
“Part of the reason for the nationwide rental reacceleration could be because renters are forced into more affordable peripheral real estate markets as prices price them out of central, more desirable metropolitan locations,” he said.