As a property manager and investor, Lucinda Morgan has dealt with plenty of perfect tenants.
However, she has had her fair share of difficult ones too.
They might be late with rent every fortnight, but not so late as to trigger an eviction.
“They just continually play that game where they’re constantly 10 or 12 days in arrears, which is making it really hard for the landlord to be able to make their home loan repayments,” she said.
Or they might keep the property in a poor state or cause damage, but not enough to warrant a difficult eviction during a fixed term.
“It needs to be severe damage to the property,” she said.
However, once a tenant is no longer covered by a fixed-term lease or is living in the property under a rolling lease, they can be evicted without a reason.
Tenants at the end of a fixed-term lease get 30 days to move out, while those on rolling leases get 90.
However, under the Minns government’s long-promised changes to rental laws, “no-grounds evictions” will be banned.
Ms Morgan, who manages hundreds of properties around Albury, said the ban would rob landlords of the right to decide.
“If they don’t have the ability to move that tenant on when the tenancy is starting to go sour, then the landlord could end up being stuck with them, essentially,” she said.
“It’s the landlord’s property. They should be able to have that right to choose who remains in their [home].”
‘It will backfire’
The Tenants’ Union argues the ban is urgently needed and wants it to apply to both fixed-term leases and rolling leases.
Union boss Leo Patterson Ross said renters were often devastated by an eviction.
“If we’re going to do that to a person, we should at least give them basic respect of telling them why,” he said.
He said without a ban, landlords could churn through tenants to circumvent rules about rent rises and avoid property maintenance.
“Unlike other consumer relationships, the provider can just avoid dealing with it,” he said.
“The power dynamics within the market are such that [landlords] aren’t having to create a customer experience that’s a positive one.”
However, Ms Morgan said tenant-churn was bad for business.
“Landlords don’t like having their property vacant,” she said.
“They’re losing rent [and] they’re also having to incur management fees.
“If the landlord wants to move the tenant on, it’s usually for a reason, as opposed to just wanting to put the rent up.”
She said if investors couldn’t control who lived in their property, they could decide to exit the market, reducing rental supply.
She pointed to Victoria, one of the states that’s already banned no-grounds evictions, which has lost more than 15,000 rental properties this year, based on bond records.
“The aim of the government policy, I believe, is to try and make it easier and fairer for tenants,” Ms Morgan said.
“However, I actually think it’s going to do the opposite.”
The Tenants’ Union said the Victorian example shouldn’t be attributed to the ban on no-grounds evictions.
Last year, Victoria also introduced new taxes on investment properties, which have been blamed for a lack of rentals.
Landlords ‘not running a charity’
Keith Almeida, who owns several Sydney investment properties, said he understood the strain renters were under.
However, he said market conditions were difficult for landlords too.
“In the end, you’re in a market and you can charge what the market can bear,” he said.
“It’s not a charity, it’s an investment.
“Rents have gone up a fair bit for various reasons, but interest costs for landlords have tripled, so it’s both sides.”
If the ban on no-grounds evictions is introduced, the government will provide additional reasons for which a tenant can still be asked to leave.
For example, if the home needs to be sold, renovated or demolished.
Or, if a landlord or an immediate family member wants to move in.
Mr Almeida said it would create an incentive for some landlords to deceive their tenants.
“It’s probably more likely to just turn honest landlords into liars,” he said.
“If they want to evict someone that’s causing a problem and they can’t really name the reason, they’ll just specify a different reason that is allowed.”
Ms Morgan said the landlords could have a genuine reason for wanting a new tenant to take over.
“[It could be] a friend … who’s gone through a domestic violence situation,” she said.
“[Landlords] won’t be able to get that current tenant out to put that other person in.”
Paws for thought
The government’s promise to make it easier for renters to keep pets is also causing concern among property investors.
Currently, a landlord can refuse any request unless it relates to an assistance animal, but they could soon be required to accept pets, unless they have a valid reason.
Those reasons may include, for example, a dangerous dog or concerns about animal welfare.
Mr Almeida said he had always allowed tenants’ pets, but believed landlords should retain their rights of refusal.
“One of my friends, at the end of the lease, he went to inspect the property and essentially, there was cat urine smell in the property.
“He has to replace the whole carpet, and get it up to scratch for the next tenants [and] that’s a big cost.
“Is it right to say that he needs to accept future pet owners if he’s had that experience?
“I don’t think so.”
Ms Morgan said she’d had similar problems.
“I’ve had to replace so many rooms of carpet, where a dog or a cat has urinated,” she said.
“And once that happens, there is no possibility to just have that carpet cleaned, to have that smell removed.
“The carpet must be replaced.”
Mr Patterson Ross acknowledged there were “horror stories” involving pets that were “real”.
However, he said landlords shouldn’t care about pets as long as their properties were returned in a good condition.
“Is there damage? Are there cleaning costs?” he said.
“Tenants are already responsible for those things and pet owners are actually pretty good about fixing up those things.”
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