Michelle McPhee, pictured with children Zoe and Benjamin, is one of the lucky ones. With a good rental history she has defied the odds andfound a rentalproperty inHealesville.
By Kath Gannaway
AN increased demand for housing as a result of the February bushfires is pushing rents up, and renters out, in Healesville and other Yarra Valley townships.
John Devine CEO of ANCHOR, the regional emergency housing provider for the region which includes the Yarra Valley area, said finding rental accommodation was difficult enough before the fires.
“The fact that we lost a number of houses in the shire and that so many people from the affected shires see this area as a good place to live, means increased pressure on a very limited resource.”
Healesville mother of three Michelle McPhee regards herself as one of the lucky ones.
She was looking at having to shift down the line after the house she was renting was sold to a Kinglake family last month. Just last week, however she was given the good news that a house had become available in Healesville.
Ms McPhee, who has lived in Healesville for 10 years, says she feels for the people who have been displaced by the fires.
“They are a lovely couple who have not only been burnt out but just made it out with their lives and they’ve been through a terrible trauma, but the more I talk with other families the more I feel I am just the first wave of a great many people who will find themselves in this position,” she said.
Ms McPhee will be paying a substantially higher rent at $270 a week but she says she is grateful just to have a roof over her head.
“The house meets our needs and keeping the children at their schools, sports and with friends they know was very important, so we are at least able to do that,” she said.
Mr Devine said ANCHOR is particularly concerned about the implications of the increased demand for established houses, and the rising rents, on those who are traditionally more marginalised.
“We’re hearing that rents were going up even before the bushfire disaster, and that has not slowed down at all.
“What that means is that many people who are socially and emotionally linked to their community are going to have to move,” he said.
Mr Devine said ANCHOR was heavily involved in the bushfire response and spent six weeks working with bushfire affected people.
“The community response was amazing. We had 300 offers of accommodation for survivors of the bushfires,” he said. While that generosity was what was needed, and was most definitely appreciated, he said most were offers of temporary accommodation.
“We are now looking at the implications of both developing long-term options for those people, whether they want to return to their homes, or find alternative accommodation in the shire, or it they want to move away from those areas,” he said.
“That has seen pressure by for instance people from Marysville who see Healesville and other like towns like it with their geographic, social and community links as a natural place (to move to).
Mr Devine said there was a lot of funding going into infrastructure under the Federal Government’s response to homelessness.
“The thing for us is making sure that infrastructure for this region is high on the list of priorities,” he said.
He said there were many people being forced out of homes by rising rent payments and the future for those people included competing in an increasingly competitive market where there are as many as 20 or 30 people vieing for the same properties.
“We won’t know the full impact (of the bushfire link to housing shortages) for six or possibly even 12 months,” he concluded.
