REIQ CEO Antonia Mercorella calls for incentives to get holiday units onto long term rental market

A leading property group has put forward a radical idea to free up units for rent amid an unprecedented low vacancy rate.

THE Real Estate Institute of Queensland (REIQ) is calling on the state government to offer owners of holiday units cash incentives to list them on the long-term rental market amid record low vacancy levels.

According to the REIQ, approximately 200,000 properties in Queensland are either vacant or used for short-term and holiday letting purposes.

CEO Antonia Mercorella said there was a huge opportunity to transition the growing number of properties in Queensland being listed on holiday sites like Airbnb on to the long term rental market.

Ms Mercorella said the issue was all the more urgent after flooding last week saw people left without homes.

“The current State Labor Government could do a lot more to reward property owners who choose to place their property on the long-term rental market,” Ms Mercorella said.

“... In many cases these are properties that fetch very high levels of rent return on the holiday letting market and so an incentive of some kind will be required to encourage them to transition their properties onto the long term market.

“We can’t just expect that people will simply hand over their properties given their own commercial needs and interests.”

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Real Estate Institute of Queensland CEO Antonia Mercorella.

Ms Mercorella suggested “cash incentives” and changes to tenancies legislation that had discouraged investors would be needed.

“The most sensible and least administrative way to incentivise these property owners to transition their properties to the long term rental market is a simple cash incentive to help reimburse (what) they stand to lose, and allows this solution to be swiftly activated as time is of the essence here,” she said.

“Also something that we know is driving property owners to the short term letting market is that it is not governed by any specific legislation and therefore owners are not required to comply with increasingly onerous and strict residential tenancies legislation.

“We’ve recently seen new tenancy laws passed and the government has announced that there’s a second phase to come. It’s a controversial topic - we do want fair and balanced residential tenancies legislation but the reality is that the harder we make it, the more we’re deterring investors from putting their properties on the long term market.”

Ms Mercorella’s call come after a series of Bulletin reports which revealed families were being forced out of the Gold Coast by soaring rental costs and vacancy levels as low as 0.3 per cent.

The REIQ has been joined in its campaign to get holiday unit owners to add their properties to the rental pool by the charity Q Shelter.

Executive Director of Q Shelter Fiona Caniglia said people were facing homelessness if more rentals did not become available.

“The impacts of the pandemic proved that home is everything to our health and safety,” Ms Caniglia said.

“The longer people live with the anxiety of not knowing where home will be, the greater the impact on our society.”

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A multi-millionaire property mogul has sought to put the Gold Coast’s housing crisis at the heart of the upcoming federal election campaign by running as an independent.

Labrador resident Kevin Young, who owns the Property Club investment company, will compete for the Moncrieff seat held by Liberal MP Angie Bell.

Mr Young, who has featured on lists of Queensland’s richest people, said he was “fed up to the back teeth” with how home owners, investors and tenants were being treated by all three levels of government.

“I am going to enter Parliament and will work until I get some justice for property owners, tenants and young Australians who want to buy their first home,” Mr Young said.

“My entire focus will be on the property sector for owners, investors, and people who rent.

“The independents will hold the balance of power and I will join them to get a fair deal for the property sector.”

Property Club owner Kevin Young.

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Mr Young said changes to Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) rules regulating mortgage lending had forced investors to sell up, reducing the number of rentals available.

“I’ve been looking after consumers in property for 27 years,” Mr Young told the Bulletin.

“I’m getting very, very frustrated at the lack of interest (in the issue) from both political parties.

“There have been a lot of poor decisions. APRA decided to approve the banks charging every investor principal payments, which meant people who had a number of investment properties, putting roofs over tenants’ heads, suddenly saw their mortgage (payments) jump up.

“The common increase (in mortgage payments) was around about 150 per cent, and you can’t ask the tenant to pay 150 per cent more rent. It makes investors sell.

“... The people buying are not investors, they’re buying to live in and they’re kicking tenants out. That’s the prime cause of this rental crisis we’re in at the moment.”

Gold Coast rental costs surged last year on the back of vacancy rates which have dropped as low as 0.3 per cent in some suburbs.

Labor candidate for Moncrieff Glen Palmer said his party would establish a Housing Australia Future Fund if elected, and criticised the Morrison government for “pretending it’s not their problem”.

“We have a housing crisis on the Gold Coast,” Mr Palmer said. “After nine years in government, housing affordability has only got worse under the Liberals and Nationals.

“We need to be looking for ways to make it easier to buy, easier to rent and ways to put a roof over the head of more homeless Aussies.

“An Albanese Labor government will establish the Housing Australia Future Fund which will build 30,000 social and affordable homes right across the country. This will create jobs, build homes and change lives including right here in our Gold Coast community.”

Sitting MP Angie Bell was contacted by the Bulletin for comment but did not respond by deadline.

A date for the federal election has yet to be announced, but it must be held no later than May 21.

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Originally published as REIQ CEO Antonia Mercorella calls for incentives to get holiday units onto long term rental market