Ballarat rental squeeze could worsen with regulations

Compliance regulations, a lack of housing stock, landlords choosing to sell and rising rents are all making it difficult to find a house.

Ballarat Real Estate general manager Allister Morrison said an unfortunate side effect of new state government compliance rules meant house owners were pulling out of the rental market.

As of March 29 this year, rental properties in Victoria will need to fall in line with compliance rules that affect electricity and gas supply.

"It's a new thing that's happened in a very short space of time," Mr Morrison said.

"There's been a crazy mad rush to get as much as possible done."

In the crunch time between now and the March deadline, the accredited workers needed will be in hot demand.

For some properties that could mean a $1500 new electrical switchboard; for others a complete rewiring or overhaul of gas and electricity systems with a cheque for thousands of dollars.

Mr Morrison said some landlords were looking at the options and choosing to sell rather than stay on as property owners.

The regulations are important to ensure safety, but have caught some owners by surprise.

Barry Plant business development manager Cameron Webb said there were more houses entering the market as building works were completed in Ballarat growth zones. The problem is these big houses in the suburbs are not good contenders in the rental market.

"They're all three bedrooms, three living areas, two or three-bathroom properties," Mr Webb said.

"The build required, for a rental, is well above what people can afford."

Mr Webb said single and double units as well as public houses were needed in bigger developments.

Ballarat is not alone in this problem. The Regional Affordable Housing Summit held in Creswick last year highlighted difficulties across the state.

Former Ballarat mayor Daniel Moloney said he was keen to see a diversity of housing stock in Ballarat.

Housing developments like this typically attract objections in the council planning phase.

At the time, Cr Moloney said these developments were "of course" not in neighbourhood character because "we have been rejecting them for decades".

But the infill is coming, with a number of plans for smaller units in front of council at the moment.

McGrath's head of property management Leonie Croft said often real estate agents needed to match tenants with owners.

"We can put the same application to one owner and they will flat stick deny them," Ms Croft said.

She said they could present the same application to other owners and they could be happy to "give them a go".

"We match tenants to owners ... and every owner is looking for something slightly different."

Currently McGrath has 17 properties up for lease and about 150 applications.

While some people will apply for multiple properties, there is still a lot of competition for renters.

Ms Croft said first impressions were really important. "Definitely answer every single question in the application - the more information a tenant provides, the easier our job becomes," she said.

When potential tenants come to inspect the property, managers typically have about fifteen minutes to meet ten potentials.

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"You've got about a one minute window to make an impression on the property manager at that point in time," Ms Croft said.

She said as "silly as it sounds" tenants should approach inspections like a job interview.

Small things like talking to the agent so they remember your name can help agents faces with hundreds of applications.

"Sometimes we have to search 350 owners before we can find one that will take the risk on your application. That's just what has to happen and that's not anything we can change."

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