Hey, Victorians – you might not be able to stump up for a home of your own, but the state government is now working to make five-year-long leases a real tenable thing.
In news that is sure to excite you and your closest squad members, Premier Daniel Andrews has announced a new fixed-term tenancy agreement is being developed for lease periods of five years or longer.
Those agreements will also be governed by the Residential Tenancies Act, meaning tenants and landlords who want to make a long-term tenancy agreement will have an actual legal framework to refer to. That provision will be ready in 2018.
Theoretically, this should make it a bit easier to find and stay in one sweet spot, doing away with the rigmarole of having to move every twelve months or so. The move also intends to provide some stability for young families, and older renters for whom stability is a priority.
Also included: an online platform tailor-made for connecting tenants and renters looking to partake in such agreements. What a bloody deal.
That all sounds well and good, and the Tenants Union of Victoria agrees. In a statement, policy officer Yaelle Caspi says “as families are more often locked out of home ownership, we are seeing a greater need for security and certainty.”
Caspi also reckons “this announcement makes sense, there is no reason why longer leases should be excluded from the Residential Tenancies Act.”
In a statement of his own, Andrews says “there are 884,000 Victorians who rent, or own a rental property. This change will give renters the chance to put down roots and landlords a more certain income.”
Read: get ready to entrench your finely-tuned sharehouse chemistry for years.
Source: Premier of Victoria / Tenants Union of Victoria.
Photo: Glenn Hunt / Getty.
