Have we reached the peak affordable housing debate in Australia? Or is it a case of that old mountaineering saying: the fog is thickest just before the summit? As someone who has been involved in building innovation for the past decade, what strikes me about the current debate is not its height, but its flatness….
It’s a simple question a lot of landlords ask. But the answer is a bit more complex. Read on to find out why. Landlord insurance is all about protecting owners from the unique risks they face when leasing their investment property. In general, the insurance can cover the property itself and/or its contents from a…
Thinking of canceling your landlord insurance policy? Read this first! There’s no denying that the cost of living is on the rise – groceries, petrol, utilities. The cost of managing your rental may also be increasing – with interest rates rising, escalating prices for goods and services impacting routine maintenance and repairs, higher council rates,…
The latest national accounts tell us Australia’s economy grew by just 0.2% in the three months to March. It’s the weakest growth since the economy shrank during the COVID lockdowns, and, before that, the weakest economic growth since December 2018. If economic growth continued at that pace for four quarters, the annual rate would be…
Reserve Bank Governor Philip Lowe and his board have pushed up interest rates yet again – for the twelfth time in 14 months – because they want to damage the economy further. Home prices have been climbing for three straight months – in March, April and May – instead of continuing to fall as they…
You’ve probably heard about the “great resignation” which saw large numbers of people resigning from their jobs in the US in 2021 and 2022. We didn’t see resignations over and above what is normal in Australia. However, we did see workers resisting the post-COVID return to the office. To better understand these trends, we conducted…
Sixty years ago the animated series The Jetsons finished its first and only season before being cancelled. Just 24 episodes were broadcast between September 1962 and March 1963. Despite this, the cartoon has achieved huge influence in popular culture, with countless reruns, a reboot in the mid-1980s (51 episodes over two seasons) and a feature-length…
![The world’s happiest countries in 2023 [Infographic]](https://cdn.propertyupdate.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/world-1-270x200.jpg)
Measuring subjective ideas like happiness and life satisfaction is tricky business. Are wealth and prosperity legitimate measures of happiness? How about safety and health outcomes? In the West, we view democracy as a key component to happiness, yet there are countries under authoritarian rule that score high on the Happiness Index. Questions like these make “ranking happiness”…
We all know factors like vacancy rates, rent prices, interest rates and other trends directly impact the investment property market. But you may not realise these can also affect landlord insurance. Let us explain… There’s no shortage of news articles and data about Australian property. While providing a snapshot of the investment market, these figures…
Can a tenant sue an agent or landlord for negligence? In a word – yes. Negligence. It’s a word that doesn’t have a nice ring to it. It’s kind of ominous – and for good reason. If a tenant is using the words ‘negligence’ or ‘negligent’ when referring to their landlord or property manager, they…
