Sheryl Houston loves her rental property. But after four years of rent jumps, she fears her days at her little patch of Gosnells paradise may be numbered.
Houston is a cleaner and when she moved into the old 3x1 nine years ago she was paying $280 a week. But by July that will be $480, and she says that will likely jump again by the end of the year to closer to $600. This represents 70 per cent of her take-home pay.
Perth’s rental vacancy rates remain at 0.7 per cent.Credit: Peter Rae
“I can’t sleep,” she said.
“I’m looking for a second job, which means because I split shift work already, I’m going to have to work at night.”
As a single income earner, Houston fears she is facing homelessness.
Her experience highlights the situation facing tens of thousands of renters at the mercy of WA’s overheated rental market where a stubbornly low vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent is pushing rent sky-high.
The average rent for a house in Perth has hit $640 per week and $595 for a three-bedroom – that is up about $200 on pre-COVID levels.
It is also a 3.2 per cent increase month on month, and 16.4 per cent higher than January 2023.
The median unit rent also rose, up 1.8 per cent over the month and 20.8 per cent over the year to $580 per week.
REIWA chief executive Cath Hart has said more increases are likely.
In Gosnells, the average rent is $550 for a three-bedroom house. When Houston moved in, the average was about $370.
Houston said her rental was “a nice old place” but often needed maintenance, and she was scared to raise maintenance issues over fears she would be evicted.
The Cook government’s new rental bill being debated in parliament includes clampdowns on practices such as rent bidding, and capping the frequency of rent increases to once per year.
Houston was sceptical the changes will help.
“It’s just making it a yearly hit and then they can put that up to whatever,” she said.
Greens MP Brad Pettitt moved amendments to the bill in parliament last week that would ban no-grounds evictions and cap rent increases to 10 per cent above inflation.
“This government has taken so long to get this bill before parliament that the urgency of the crisis has completely outstripped any impact that these timid reforms will have in improving the situation for renters,” he said.
“Introducing rent caps is the simplest way to stop exorbitant and greedy rent increases that are hurting renters the most.”
That amendment will fail with Commerce Minister Sue Ellery confirming the government was not considering a rental increase cap.
Commerce Minister Sue Ellery said the government acknowledged some tenants were doing it tough and the bill was designed to help.
“With the current challenges facing WA’s rental market, it is not in the community’s interests to make it more complex to own and manage a long-term rental property,” she said.
“Our state needs more investors in the market and uncertainty about their ability to manage their own asset may stand in the way of increasing supply.”
Read more