Demand for Canberra rentals force long delays for bond refunds

An influx of new tenants entering the Canberra rental market has led to lengthy delays in bonds being returned to those moving house.

The rental bond office said it aimed to return bonds to tenants within 10 business days, but during peak rental season that wait could blow out to about a month.

But some people, including Emilie Patteson, have waited up to two months to have their bond returned.

Emilie Patteson has waited for her bond refund for almost two months.Credit: Elesa Kurtz

In the first three months of 2019, the rental bond office returned more than 3700 bonds to those moving house, compared to 2700 rental bonds returned in an off-peak period from June to August last year.

An ACT government spokeswoman said the refund of rental bonds can take more time in "peak rental season", from December to February.

She said additional staff were put on at the office to help meet the demand.

"During the peak period, refunds are prioritised and more staff are allocated to this task," the spokeswoman said.

Garran resident Emilie Patteson said she had been waiting for two months for her rental bond to be returned.

Ms Patteson lodged the forms for the return of her bond at the end of January.

"I've been in my current place for 12 months and had a housemate move out and a new one come in, and our real estate agent said we had to pay a new bond in full and get our old bond back," Ms Patteson said.

"I'm still waiting for it to come through, and I think it will still be a long time before I see it returned. I don't expect to see it for another few weeks."

Ms Patteson said she's been put at financial risk due to the long wait time for the bond.Credit: Elesa Kurtz

Ms Patteson said previous bonds had been returned to her in other times of the year relatively quickly.

She said the long waiting period for the current bond to be refunded has left her severely out of pocket.

"It's put me at risk. I'm self-employed as an artist and I also have a casual job, so I don't have a regular week-to-week income," Ms Patteson said.

"The bond is a lot of money, and it's incredibly frustrating."

To compound the delay further, Ms Patteson said after returning the bond form to the real estate agent, it wasn't lodged with the bond office for two weeks.

She said the bond form was only sent to the office after she repeated inquired about it.

"I haven't been offered an explanation as to why. If I didn't say anything about it, it wouldn't have been lodged at all."

ACT Tenants Union executive director Deb Pippen said real estate agents or landlords holding on to bond forms for long periods of time was a factor in the long delays.

"Lots of people assume that landlords and real estate agents would act in the interests of tenants, and that's not necessarily the case," Ms Pippen said.

"A lot of tenants aren't aware that they can make the claim to the bond office themselves and get the bond back quicker."

Better Renting ACT executive director Joel Dignam said the start of the year was the busiest time for the rental market. He said it was concerning many renters had to wait for weeks to receive their bond.

"It's an expensive experience moving house, and people will struggle with just the cost of moving, let alone a new bond, and the sooner they get the old one back, the better," Mr Dignam said.

Real estate agent and owner of Little Bird Property Heidi Rosin said there had been many instances where bond office staff were unable to find the relevant forms.

"The issue that we're finding across the board is when we go to refund the bond to the tenant, the bond officer often comes back and says they can't find the forms to start with," Ms Rosin said.

"In other words, they don't know where the money is it's allocated to the tenant, and it does raise some concerns."

Ms Rosin said in most cases bonds are returned in full to the tenant.

"Broadly speaking there might be a delay in lodging the bond forms if repairs need to be carried out and the tenant has to agree to it," Ms Rosin said.

"The only items that are routinely taken out of the bond are things like final water usage or lost keys or cleaning."

Figures from the bond office revealed more than one in five Canberra renters who requested their bonds back did not get it returned in full.

Out of the 15,787 bonds that were returned in 2018, 12,735 of them were fully refunded to the tenant.

A further 3052 rental bonds were partially refunded to the tenant, with the rest of the money going to the landlord or property agent.

The government spokeswoman said the delay in refunds getting returned had been steadily reducing since 2017, when bonds were handled through the ACT Revenue Office.