Cairns rentals: Residents feel ‘darkness, despair’ at trying to find home

A Cairns resident scrambling to find her next home has spoken of the “stressful and disheartening” journey for tenants left in limbo by the desperate shortage of available rental properties. HAVE YOUR SAY

A CAIRNS resident scrambling to find her next rental home has spoken of the “darkness and despair” for tenants left in limbo by the desperate shortage of available properties

As the Real Estate Institute of Queensland’s September 2021 Vacancy Report revealed, the Cairns rental vacancy rate has plummeted to 0.6 per cent, and resident Jeannie Johansson is experiencing just how hard it is to get a home for the family.

Ms Johansson, 49, said her family which comprises her husband and three children aged 17, 19 and 21, have been given notice to move out of their Bentley Park home after it sold for $120,000 more than the owner paid for it three years ago.

“It’s stressful and disheartening, you feel darkness and despair and you want that light at the end of the tunnel,” she said.

“Especially when you hear others are bidding on rents and owners jacking up prices.

“I was recently at a house viewing and in the half-hour between leaving home and arriving there, the rent went up $50 from $550 a week to $600.”

And the toll of looking for a new home in a tough market is start to have a negative impact.

“You don’t sleep at night,” she said.

“You look around your house and you wonder where will you put everything, do we need to hire a storage unit?

“We have a month after our lease runs out which is the same date our 17-year-old finishes school.”

At a recent inspection Ms Johansson said there must have been 60 people viewing the house when she said she heard a man tell the agent he had already submitted his application and paid the deposit.

The current FNQ rent squeeze means prospective tenants in Cairns are often struggling to find a house to call home.

She this is made people feel desperate and hopeless.

The times houses are open to view were also a problem as they were often held during business hours, she said.

Ms Johansson said she was fortunate as she worked for a community services agency and could get time out of her working day to inspect properties.

“But this doesn’t suit people who may not have understanding bosses,” she said.

“Our real estate agent has been fantastic, and to be honest, I have not met a horrible agent, they have all been really good.

“I feel sorry for them as well, because if people are buying homes and not renting, then every real estate firm has a rent roll and what will happen to those staff?”

Originally published as Cairns rentals: Residents feel ‘darkness, despair’ at trying to find home