High-profile The Project presenter Waleed Aly has rejected the Greens’ proposal for a rent freeze, which if implemented could already have saved Australian renters thousands of dollars.
In a lively segment about The projectt On Thursday, Aly discussed the founder of popular rental property review website S*** Rentals Jordan van den Berg, also known online as ‘Purple Pingers’.
Van den Berg told The Project that he is in favor of freezing rents, revealing the positive impact it would have on tenants’ lives.
“It’s pretty simple: give renters a little leeway and allow them to spend money on something other than an increasing human right.”
‘I know people who have to choose between medicine and rent. You should never have to choose between those two fundamental things to be alive, or putting food on the table for your family and that kind of thing,’ he said.
Aly agreed that no one should have to choose between medications and rent, but that’s when she questioned the proposal to freeze rent.
He said the evidence from around the world on the rent freeze concept is not all that encouraging.
“In the United States, the result was that many houses were left uninhabitable because the owners filed insurance claims for the damage,” he said.
High-profile The Project presenter Waleed Aly has rejected the Greens’ proposal to freeze rents, which could have already saved Australian renters thousands of dollars.
In a lively segment on The Proje t on Thursday, Aly discussed the founder of popular rental property review website S*** Rentals, Jordan van den Berg (pictured), also known online as ‘Purple Pingers ‘.
Aly said there has been an increase in rental bidding on the black market, where official rental is one thing and rental bidding happens in the background.
He said the problems with the rent freeze were not just limited to the United States.
‘In the UK they found social segregation, so it simply meant that the owners gave all the properties to professional families without children and, in reality, it was the most disadvantaged who were left out.
‘In Berlin there was a huge drop in rental supply. These are really serious side effects. Isn’t it a huge risk to take on something like this?
Van den Berg disagreed and said Aly was not comparing like with like.
‘In Australia we have this culture of investing in housing, we’re not comparing the same government subsidies, the same demographic breakdown, the same capital gains tax rebates, the same negative concessions for investment.
“So in the United States, where those things don’t exist, by freezing rents we don’t get comparable results,” he said.
Aly insisted that a rent freeze could even make the problem worse.
Van den Berg refuted that a rent freeze would prevent people from becoming landlords.
‘At the end of the day, even if you can charge a little less for rent, you’ll make a capital gain when you sell the house, that’s how it will work.
“But we must also consider that this is not the only response to the real estate crisis, it is a small band-aid that we can put on an open wound and that we must combine with long-term political solutions,” he said. .
Van den Berg expressed the urgency of freezing rents.
“Tenants need immediate help right now, so let’s also work on the bigger picture.”
