‘Do not move to Sydney’: British woman’s warning about Australia
A British woman who just moved to Australia shared the grim reality of trying to find a home in Sydney in the middle of a rental crisis.
Ellie warned fellow Brits that moving Down Under was not easy and left dozens of house hunters queuing at rental inspections for two-bedroom apartments in the city’s eastern suburbs.
She went to five house openings in and around Bondi and claimed between 70 and 100 people turned up.
‘DO NOT move to Sydney… if you think it will be easy. I moved from London to Sydney with no idea of the rental crisis,” Ellie said in a TikTok video.
She explained that the “competition is insane” for rental properties in Sydney, and with so many people she could barely see the apartment.
“There’s a line to get in and you literally can’t even see it, there’s so many people in there,” Ellie said.
In the caption, she wrote that moving to Sydney isn’t all “sunshine and rainbows”, but “mass rejection, queues and a rental crisis”.
Many people agreed with the traveler, and some suggested she look further from the city.
“I had 96 applications for my three-bed rental,” said one homeowner.
One user suggested: ‘You need to leave Central Sydney. Such as Chatswood Parramatta Cronulla or Hornsby. It’s a lot easier!’
However, others have criticized those migrating Down Under, claiming they are making the rental crisis worse.
“There wouldn’t be a rental crisis if you guys stopped moving here,” one man said.
A British woman who just moved to Australia shared the grim reality of trying to find a home in Sydney in the midst of a rental crisis (Photo: Australians queuing to view a rental property)
Sydney isn’t the only Australian city facing a worrying rental crisis.
Earlier this month, videos emerged online of hundreds of people queuing for an apartment in Melbourne’s CBD.
“It seems impossible to find a two bedroom apartment in Melbourne city at the moment,” one woman wrote.
“Apartment inspections are a little different here.”
The rental crisis across Australia has been a nightmare for many for more than a year.
Victoria introduced a ban on ‘rental bidding’ – soliciting or encouraging higher bids than the advertised price and playing potential tenants against each other – in March 2021 in the hope of cooling the market.
From December 17, 2022, licensed real estate agents and estate agents in New South Wales were also banned from soliciting rental bids.
However, rents have continued to rise and vacancy rates have hardly improved.
Vacancy rates in NSW have fallen to levels not seen since 2003, while prices have risen 3.2 per cent, according to PropTrack.
Meanwhile, annual data from the Rental Affordability Index showed that every capital city had experienced a decline in rental affordability, with low-income renters such as single parents, retirees and job seekers among the most vulnerable.