Housing crisis: Sunrise Beach woman enters bidding war with other rental applicants

A mum-of-three has described the “exhausting” process of applying for more than 130 rentals on the Sunshine Coast as the Noosa region housing crisis deepens. Watch the video.

A woman who applied for more than 130 rentals on the Sunshine Coast says she entered bidding wars with other applicants before finding a home.

It took Sunrise Beach resident Mara Svingulis about seven months to land a rental in a hunt she described as “exhausting”.

The mum-of-three said she was driving up to four hours from Lennox Head in New South Wales, with a baby, to view single properties on the Sunshine Coast.

“At least 50 to 150 other people were viewing those properties,” she said.

She said filling out the rental applications was laborious and other would-be renters would offer $50 to $100 a week more rent for the property to ensure their application was successful.

“We would also counter offer, and then they would counter offer, and it was just a matter of who the owner picked and I think that’s sort of cruel,” Ms Svingulis said.

She said her partner had a job on the Sunshine Coast so he stayed to work as she drove back and forth.

“He works in a family business, and had worked there for 20 years, he’d come back up here to continue working,” she said.

“I know a lot of people that basically tell lies on their application to go ‘this is where I’m working and what I’m doing’ so they can get properties.

“It’s just a hard market for everybody.”

The mum-of-three said her family was paying $800 a week for the four-bedroom home they finally successfully applied for.

She said with rent so expensive it was near impossible to save for a home loan.

“You think ‘should we go back to share housing?’, but we’re in our 40s with teenagers and a baby and we’re not going back to share housing ever again,” Ms Svingulis said.

As the Noosa region housing crisis continues, a real estate agency that offers people affordable options has expanded to Tewantin.

Purpose Real Estate offers all the real estate services of other agencies, and opened in Nambour about five years ago.

General manager Lindell Gittoes said it also offered rentals to those eligible for the National Rental Affordability Scheme.

Noosa Mayor Clare Stewart, Purpose Real Estate chairwoman Helen Glanville, principal Andrew Elvin, general manager Lindell Gittoes, director Gordon Sutherland and Member for Noosa Sandy Bolton at the opening of the Tewantin Purpose Real Estate office on June 27, 2022.

She said the agency managed shared accommodation for women over 55, which consisted of nine rooms in Nambour.

The Tewantin resident of 22 years said she was excited to open a second agency in the Noosa region.

“We just hope with us being here we can make a difference in the area,” Ms Gittoes said.

Noosa councillors on June 23, 2022, endorsed the release of a draft housing strategy to the community to address the crisis.

The council will hold pop-in sessions, and online survey and other engagement for the public in July.

Mayor Clare Stewart said there was no silver bullet for a solution to the housing crisis in Noosa.

“While it is going to take investment from all levels of government, Noosa can determine its own destiny by developing actions to guide how we provide affordable housing for the future needs of the shire,” she said.

Ms Stewart said the draft housing strategy was about delivering a plan so everybody within the Noosa Shire could access affordable housing into the future.

A Rental Crisis Report commissioned by Rent Rabbit showed Cooroy, Currimundi, Beerwah, Bli Bli and Marcoola as five Sunshine Coast and Noosa markets with a rental vacancy rate below one per cent.