Your Story: Rate rise hits young couple hard

A YOUNG ratepayer shares her struggle with the increasing costs of owning a home in Gladstone.

This story was submitted by Georgina Long. If you have a story you'd like to share, click here.

"WE BOUGHT a house in the older section of Seaview Heights in 2014.

Gladstone was already hard enough to buy in.

Repayments and the increased rates on top of insurance and repairs - it's becoming very hard.

We were given a $600 increase on last year's rates, and now pay $3100 a year.

I was unemployed for six months to care for my partner and it took me over four months to find a job.

I was only able to obtain casual employment at a local childcare centre.

The current rate rise would mean that our animals have to have lower-quality food, we now have to go without meat a few nights a week and air-con this summer will be a big no-no.

We planned to get married next year and start a family shortly after, and this has brought it to a halt.

If living in Gladstone means we have to live like this, then sorry, we will sell and move elsewhere!

My sister in Cairns, whose house is worth double mine, only pays $2400 a year in rates. My grandparents in Tasmania, whose house is also worth more than ours, only pay $690.

I think the rate rise and the rates prices in general are very expensive.

With the drop in land value, rates shouldn't have gotten more expensive at all.

The council needs to stop re-planting plants every month and trying to make the city beautiful for the upcoming cruise ships.

The locals can't afford it.

The mayor or councillors don't feel the financial pain us locals face because they get paid a lot more than us.

I'm also extremely angry that we have to pay for water access when we own the pipes anyway.

My partner was hit by a car earlier this year and will find it hard to get work just like everyone else.

It's hard enough owning a home at such a young age.

We need an outsider to review the budget, and maybe these councillors could do with a pay cut as well.

Ratepayer-funded trips to Japan and morning teas need to stop.

Call Japan on the phone and pack your own food from home.

And the blob 'art' at the front of the airport that cost us ratepayers $25,000 needs to be sold and use the money to pay off council debt."

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Originally published as Your Story: Rate rise hits young couple hard