Have you been asked for a rent reduction?

Spot on!! The professional unemployed will not be able to cope on the old newstart payments.

 

equally cruel to our kids and their kids who have to pick up the tab

 

Personally, I think what the Gov should have done was to increase the Newstart for all NEW recipients, but not tie it to Covid. So, you could have an 'easing in' for newbies for X months at the higher rates, before it reduces to the existing levels. The higher amount is only for those who are leaving full time employment (not some other welfare payment), to give them time to find new employment.

 

Silly to increase it in the first place for the people who were used to the old payments. Things will be so much worse for them once it’s cut. Not many would ne putting money aside for a rainy day. I mean it probably should be more than it was but doubling it then cutting it back to what it was makes no sense.

 

The increases were not a welfare issue, they were a fiscal stimulus measure which is why it was applied so broadly.
If nothing was put aside then the stimulus measures worked exaclty as intended.
Having half the country locked down when implementing the stimulus is the only thing that raises my eyebrows.

 

I'm quite aware that it was for stimulating the ecconomy, however giving it to existing welfare recipients is only going to make them more dependant on it. They can't spend it in the normal way either, so online shopping, supermarkets, bottle shops & drug dealers will be the real beneficiaries.

 

feel sorry for the government,
they dont do anything, they cop flack from everyone
they introduce stimulus, theyre going to cop flack when they reduce

my limited understanding of the stimulus is to stimulate the economy, hence giving it to people who will spend it all aspects, such as groceries, booze, ciggies, hair dye, KFC, online shopping (does drug dealers even count as part of the economy?)

 

Probably, but welfare dependency is not relevant to the objectives that were trying to be achieved.
Politically a smart move by a centre right government that would rarely appeal to welfare beneficiaries too.
Now if only GST would be increased and the base broadened, but that's a whole new debate.

 

We are fortunate in that our 2 tenants are both on the aged pension, so their payment has not changed.

 

First Queensland Tribunal outcome awards tenant rent reduction to 30% of their income.

COVID-19 affected family wins genuine rent reduction in QCAT! — Tenants Queensland

 

Haha - of our 20 rental properties the 1st one to ask for a rental reduction is the NSW dept of housing, the one we thought would be the safest. They rent a 3 bedroom villa near Parramatta from us as it has disability access.

We expect rents in Sydney to steadily reduce until overseas students And migrants return in numbers which won’t happen this year.

 

Really? They haven't been Covid affected.

 

They have been tenants for 8 years and are on a periodic tenancy atm. They stated they have reviewed the rent in the area and noted an increased vacancy rate.

so they have offered a 3 year tenancy with a slightly over 10% rent reduction.

 

Periodic + 3 year lease +10% only reduction

Is actually quite a reasonable offer!
Well done

 

Sure, there may be a higher vacancy rate, but what are comparable rentals asking (and getting) in the current market. Knowing this would depend on whether it's a reasonable offer.

 

A couple of interesting points to this that I will quote from the link.

So reading between the lines and making an assumption -- the renter has savings but doesn't want to use it to pay for rent. Instead they want the LL to use their savings.

Will LL insurance cover some of the loss of rent for the LL?

But isn't that future debt what they rightfully owe? I guess not anymore. I'm slightly confused over what debt actually means now.

I'm not saying that this outcome wasn't correct for the renter, but it certainly wasn't correct for the LL. Maybe the LL should have come to the table with a 10-20% rental discount instead of standing firm though.

I wonder if they'll be able to pay full rent after 6 months? Or will they have to use savings? Or they might have to move. If that's the case, why not move now? I guess why move now when you can stay in a better place for cheap. Does that seem right?

What will the LL do after 6 months? I imagine the LL will not renew the lease if that will be allowable in the future. It's certainly a messy situation now and I imagine there has been a breakdown in trust between both parties.

What interests me is the savings. Renters have been renting for 10 years. Both working, means all they both needed to do was save 3k each per year and they'd have 60k savings. That's less than 60 dollars a week each to save. That's more than plausible, isn't it? I guess it's not???

 

"drawing the line" comment pricked my ears when I read it,
not sure if it was Lucy talking or the journalist talking

 

Not a journalist, it's someone from Tenants QLD. They have a particular bias (obviously). The Domain article on this was a lot more neutral.

 

The article does not really provide enough information to draw a complete conclusion without each of us having to make a few assumption.

One thing that does seem probable though is that the tenant suffered some sort of perceived hardship, went through the appropriate actions to seek a rent reduction, landlord refused to budge, so the tenant decided to let the tribunal make a decision rather than deal with a landlord who didnt appear to want to negotiate in the first place.

Could they have dived into savings? Who knows. Could the landlord have accessed mortgage relief? Who knows.
Why was the landlords financial position so weak after having the same long term tenant? Who knows, but the tribunal obviously decided it wasnt.

 

Agree. we don't get enough info to know the full scenario.

There is no disputing that the tenant was in hardship.
But the LL did agree to a rent reduction but with the proviso that the T pay it back later. But that wasn't acceptable to the T, which I find very confusing.

This is purely a 'what if', but indulge me. What if the T suddenly become rich in a few years. They are flushed with cash. Would they come back and reimburse the money that the LL lost due to the reduced rent? I very much doubt it. But this is exactly the same scenario just in reverse.

And if you're unwilling to divulge savings, there is a good chance it means you have savings.

In the Domain article it turns out that the lost rent is going to be about 50 dollars a week. It's not a massive amount, but it's big enough. I understand that QCAT have decided they don't have to pay this money back, but I simply can't understand why that is so. As you say though, we can only speculate.