Private residential landlords are unfairly demonised

The boyfriends and relatives of tenants are a rarely spoken about issue. I recall one otherwise good tenant, who had a boyfriend who caused damage to the property and was eventually charged with the murder of her infant. Unapproved additional residents are another significant issue, but their existence and number can be hard to prove.

Some tenants do stupid things. One tenant was distracted by a phone call while frying chips. When she discovered the chip pan on fire, she threw water on it, making matters much worse. The damage bill (mostly the effects of smoke) was $20,000. The tenant stopped paying rent and subsequently "did a runner", when she found out that she could be held liable.

Most landlords value "forever tenants" and provide them with a modest discount to the market because of the savings in lease fees and vacancy costs. In my opinion, bans on "no grounds evictions" mainly protect bad tenants.

The by-product of much of the recent government intervention is that it has become a lot more expensive and a lot less desirable for investors to buy homes for rent. If the trend of "landlord-bashing" by government continues, investors will simply walk away from the rental housing market and put their money elsewhere.

If and when this happens, the rental crisis will further worsen. Landlords already are noticeably starting to vote with their feet in Victoria.