A real estate agent has apologized after becoming involved in an online affair with a prominent tenants’ rights activist, as his boss also provided a sensational reason for the row.
Rental activist Jordan van den Lamb, founder of the website s***rentals.org, organized a protest at three vacant houses in an upscale Melbourne suburb on December 14 to highlight the number of properties left vacant during a national housing crisis .
Mr van den Lamb, known online as PurplePingers, shared a video of 84 Western Street, with the banner ‘this house has been empty for 15 years’, at Instagram.
Nathan Westerbrink, director of Raine and Horne’s Lane Cove on Sydney’s Lower North Shore, was angered by Mr Van den Lamb’s antics and left a scathing response to the video.
“Pay your own rent loser,” he wrote.
Now Mr Westerbink, in a humiliating climb down seen by Daily Mail Australia, has issued a lengthy apology – as his own boss suggested he was drunk when he sent the message.
“I didn’t pay attention to your message at the time, I honestly thought it was a message about wanting to squat in vacant houses, hence my message re rent,” Mr Westerbink writes.
He added, “From the beginning, I saw you working hard to make a positive impact. (My) sincere and sincere apologies.”
Nathan Westerbrink (pictured above), director of Raine and Horne’s Lane Cove on Sydney’s Lower North Shore, was angered by the antics of rental activist Jordan van den Lamb and left a scathing response to the video (below)
Mr Westerbink’s boss, Stuart Bourne, has also apologized to Mr Van den Lamb.
“I have discussed this matter directly with the employee and would like to say that it does not reflect my or my company’s values,” he wrote.
‘I believe this occurred while alcohol was being consumed. Although this is not an excuse. My apologies again.’
Mr Van den Lamb, who is running for the Victorian Socialists, was unconvinced by the apology at next year’s federal election.
“I would say that drunken minutes reveal sober thoughts and for a rent seeker to tell someone else to pay the rent is very ironic,” he told Daily Mail Australia.
Mr Westerbink was approached for further comments for this publication.
Social media users were quick to slam him after his original post.
“He has everything wrong with society,” one person wrote.
Another said: ‘So unprofessional.’
Now, in a humiliating climb down seen by Daily Mail Australia, Mr Westerbink has issued a profuse apology (pictured above)
His own boss suggested he was drunk when he sent the message
Others praised Mr Van den Lamb and the community for highlighting Australia’s poor housing market.
“Absolutely appalling that these landlords have been able to leave this empty for all these years,” one person wrote.
‘Well done! Broken system. It’s all of Australia. Most of the houses in the region are also empty,” a second noted.
A third added: ‘Well done! Too many people are homeless; houses should not be empty’.
The protest in Melbourne came to an end after police issued a ‘move on’ order to Mr Van den Lamb and the other activists.
It was the first of many planned protests targeting landlords who deliberately left their homes empty.
Mr Van den Lamb has previously condemned Australia’s housing market as a system ‘rigged’ for the rich.
“In a prosperous society like Australia, no one should have to struggle just to keep a roof over their head, especially when hundreds of thousands of homes are empty every night,” Van den Lamb said.
Mr Van den Lamb (pictured), who is running for the Victorian Socialists, was unconvinced by the apology at next year’s federal election
Jordan van den Lamb, known online as PurplePingers, together with other activists organized a protest against three adjacent houses that had been empty for more than twenty years.
“It is perfectly legal for property owners to leave homes vacant for years or even decades. This is unacceptable.
“Leaving homes empty in the midst of a homelessness crisis is a crime against basic human decency.
‘Australia’s richest people have reaped a huge windfall from property price growth in recent decades.
‘The system is set up in such a way for the wealthy that they often lose very little when they leave properties empty. This has to change.’
Mr Van den Lamb added that the housing market is currently at a ‘crisis point’, with homelessness growing rapidly and the number of people on social housing waiting lists rising.
“We want to build a movement – of the homeless, of renters, of everyone suffering from the housing crisis,” Van den Lamb said.
‘We cannot expect our parliament of landlords to solve this for us. The majority of them benefit from the current system. People need to take matters into their own hands.’
In total, almost 100,000 homes were vacant or underutilized in 2023 – a shocking figure for every 20 homes in Melbourne, according to a report by tax reform institute Prosper Australia.
That’s enough to house more than 250,000 Australians – which is more than the combined number of people experiencing homelessness and the number of people on the social housing waiting list.
The report, which analyzed water consumption, showed that more than 27,000 homes (1.5 percent of all homes) would be completely empty in 2023, while another 70,000 (3.7 percent of all homes) were barely used.
It also found the highest concentration of vacant homes was in Brunswick East, with 1,214 or 12.7 per cent of properties vacant.