City Futures Blog

News and research in housing and urban policy, from Australia’s leading urban policy research centre.

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Entries Tagged as 'Law'

The insecurity of private renters – how do they manage it?

May 24th, 2017 · No Comments · Affordability, Guest appearance, Law, Sydney, Tenancy, Wellbeing

Alan Morris, University of Technology Sydney; Hal Pawson, UNSW, and Kath Hulse, Swinburne University of Technology. This article was originally published on The Conversation.  A growing proportion of Australian households depend on the private rental sector for accommodation. This growth has occurred despite substantial insecurity of tenure under the law, unlike other countries with high private […]

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Who’ll get hit by ‘one strike’ and ‘three strikes’ in public housing?

March 27th, 2017 · No Comments · Law, Tenancy

There’s ‘evidence-based policy’, and there’s ‘sports-metaphor-based policy’. New South Wales is the latest Australian jurisdiction to adopt ‘three strikes’ and ‘one strike’ policies for evicting social housing tenants on grounds of criminal offending and anti-social behaviour. The New South Wales approach is, however, different: whereas in other States ‘strikes’ policies apply to social housing landlords and […]

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Rental insecurity: why fixed long-term leases aren’t the answer

February 16th, 2017 · No Comments · Law, Tenancy

By Chris Martin, UNSW. Originally published on The Conversation. The insecurity of rental housing and unsatisfactory condition of many properties are receiving much-deserved media attention following the release of a national survey of tenants. However, the stock response to the insecurity this revealed – longer fixed-term agreements – is not the answer. The solution to the […]

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Changes to strata management laws and home modifications

September 5th, 2016 · No Comments · Cities, Demographics, Law, Strata, Wellbeing

by Ryan van den Nouwelant and Hazel Easthope, City Futures Research Centre The recently introduced reforms to strata scheme management have been wide-ranging. Some of the more headline grabbing changes include new by-laws about pets, parking and smoking, electronic voting and tenant participation. One reform that has not received as much attention is the change […]

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NSW tenancy law review misses on security for tenants

June 28th, 2016 · No Comments · Government, Law, Tenancy

Last week the NSW State Government tabled in Parliament the report of its five-year review of the Residential Tenancies Act 2010. Its strongest point is a series of recommendations relating to domestic violence, including for provisions for victims to immediately terminate a tenancy because of domestic violence, and avoid being held liable for property damage […]

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Tenancy law reform for ‘secure occupancy’

February 8th, 2016 · No Comments · Government, Law, Tenancy

New South Wales tenancy laws are under review, and City Futures has made a submission drawing on our research into how well Australia and other countries provide for ‘secure occupancy’ in rental housing. The research, conducted in collaboration with Swinburne University for AHURI, sought to capture the extent to which households in rental housing can […]

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