A MOVING EXPERIENCE

Sydney is a hard city when you’re short of cash and renting a civilized place to live is a daunting and heartbreaking process if you’re thinking about living within an hour or so from your place of work. My friend and I decided that sharing a house would be an economical alternative to sole occupancy and have been looking for a three bedroom house we can afford, yet will provide us with individual privacy.
To start with, we decided we needed a three bedroom house, one bedroom each and a spare room for storage/home office. We set our budget at $500.00 a week, which initially seemed reasonable. This is what we have found:
To start with, we have two small, ageing cats, but we have discovered that many owners stipulate “no pets.” We looked at a very clean, modern property recently, a rare find. But the owner said he was allergic to cats, so our application was rejected. His son said they’d never had animals when he was young, so how can you have an allergy to something you’ve never experienced?
I have always had cats in my life, they are gentle, beautiful creatures who are easy to look after and very hygienic in their habits. I have a house in Tasmania and if I rented it out myself, I wouldn’t dream of prohibiting pets as I know how much animals mean to some people. They are friends and companions and contribute greatly to the psychological health of the owners. All I can say is that property owners who make such a stipulation are, well frankly, bastards. I have a suspicion that in NSW, it is illegal to make such exclusion, but I might be wrong. Generally about half of the properties advertised stipulate “no pets.”
Secondly, owners have a very strange idea of the realistic value of their rental property. I viewed one this morning in a horrible suburb and a fair walk from the station. The photograph looked cute, so I travelled across town to view it. (Most home inspections are at the weekends and if you know anything about City Rail in Sydney, half the entire rail system is out of service during this period for what is euphemistically-called “track work.” So getting about is difficult).
This particular property, on a busy main road, was just under $500 a week and was sandwiched between a block of units and a derelict shop which actually intruded across part of the front of the house. I walked in, took one look and walked out. It was the filthiest hovel I have ever seen; it was dark, dirty with dirty dark blue carpet throughout. But it was when I saw the kitchen, my nerve broke and I fled! When I eventually found a railway station with a toilet that was actually unlocked, I just had to wash my hands. I hadn’t touched anything, but I just itched all over. It was a horrible experience, probably the worst to date.
The “older house” bracket is almost invariably deficient in the kitchen and bathroom department. Both are usually very small as these rooms were not considered as important then as they are now. Shower over bath and toilet crammed behind the door is typical in the bathroom and work surfaces and cupboards in the kitchen are usually scruffy and inadequate. But whether these rooms are modern or “original,” it is not necessarily reflected in the asking price.
I think largely, the fault may be laid at the door of the rental agent who, from bitter experience is guilty of two things. Firstly the description of the properties in their advertisements is blatantly misleading. A “bright sunny aspect” is usually anything but, “large bedrooms,” means small bedrooms, “freshly renovated kitchen,” can mean anything, but usually is still squalid, “huge garden” is blatantly dishonest as the majority of blocks in Sydney have no space for such a garden. There are dozens of examples of this mealy-mouthed deception and is typical of all agents we have seen to date. Secondly, the agent is appears immune to any drawbacks to the property. In one case, we queried the fact that the paint was hanging from the kitchen ceiling in ribbons and we asked him whether the owner intended to repaint this. He looked at us in astonishment at our temerity in even asking. Usually the inverse square law applies when viewing property, the tackier it is, the ruder and less prompt the agent.
We looked at a property recently and as the agent had brought the wrong keys we were unable to view it, after travelling across town for the privilege. I would have thought that having the right keys to admit prospects for inspection is fundemental to the job!
Close to transport can also be open to interpretation. “A few minutes walk to shops, schools and transport,” is a phrase often seen. This has constantly fooled us and a twenty minute fast hike from the station is typical. In many cases, properties in our price range have no public transport whatsoever and as we are between cars, shopping and commuting becomes onerous.
Close to schools can be a two-edged sword. In one instance, the house being viewed was next to a school playground. On remarking about the noise potential, the agent advised us it was a “happy sound.” Yes, so is a jumbo jet passing low over your head in the inner western suburbs! Except not quite as loud as five hundred kids screaming at break time.
We looked at another house recently at the top end of our budget. It was actually quite nice and we chatted to the owner about it. He was proud of the fact that he’d renovated it to the condition it had been in when it was built. This may be a very laudable recreation of a piece of history, but the lack of built-in wardrobes in the bedrooms is silly and the wiring was such that I suspect an electric fire and mixer being turned on together would be about the load limit on the fuse box. The owner also lived next door. Enough said.
The whole process has been most distressing for us. The lies and deceptions, the misleading descriptions, the “selective” photography, the indifference of the owners and their fantasies as to what represents a reasonable price for their accommodation all have their effect. Some years ago, I rented a waterfront ground floor unit in Neutral Bay. Not only was there NO bond requested, but the landlord gave us the first month free. In addition, he raised the rent annually only in accordance to the CPI. A gentleman and not, as Paul Keating might have said, the “unrepresentative swill,” to which we have recently become accustomed.
What is the result of all this? We have decided to move right away from Sydney, where we can rent a lovely, roomy house for less than half the equivalent in Sydney. My friend can pursue her interests in a beautiful, peaceful environment and I will happily rent a room in the city, close to where I work during the week and commute to an idyllic setting at the weekends.
Our experience in Sydney in attempting to rent decent accommodation is, typical of the city. Consider the appalling level of public transport, the intrusive and aggressive police force, the noise, rudeness and vulgarity, the absence of good entertainment venues, the high prices in mediocre restaurants and the chronically neglected urban infrastructure, country living seems a very good alternative indeed!