Kim Macdonald: Heat on landlords to make homes liveable as mercury soars

This year — 2023 — is officially the hottest year on record for planet Earth. So the recent forecast that some particularly hot El Nino weather is set to hit Australia for five months from November makes me wonder what kind of fresh hell is on the way. I recognise I am one of the lucky ones, after recently getting a new air-conditioner which I adore so much I blow it kisses when I turn it off at night. But I know the stifling heat of life without air-conditioning in the family home. It is heat so bad that it saps the life from you and makes children wake up crying. You dread cooking and can’t even enjoy a cup of hot coffee. Certain rooms become no-go zones and the whole house is off-limits to visitors. It is a heat, unfortunately, that is par for the course for many renters. A new report from the Better Renting Campaign shows that six WA rentals self-reported indoor temperatures of more than 30 degrees for nearly 40 per cent of the period November 22 and 25 this year. The temperature rarely dropped below 25 degrees in any of the homes over that period, when maximum temperatures reached 39 degrees. As the campaign group’s executive director Joel Dignam points out, some renters were roasting in their own lounge rooms and that was back in spring. They must be anxious about summer. In a regular rental market, tenants would feel more comfortable asking their landlords to install ceiling fans or air-conditioning to cope with the unbearable heat. But given the difficulties people have in getting a home, and the ever-present fear of eviction and rental price hikes, few are comfortable making any kind of demand. And it seems few landlords offer to stump up the cost of their own free will. There is merit in a renewed push from housing advocates for a minimal set of temperature control standards in WA rental properties. Any new mandatory minimums should of course be tempered by the fact many landlords are going through a cost-of-living crisis too, which has led some of them to roast in their own homes too. But a suggestion from Kath Snell, from housing advocacy ShelterWA, appears to strike the perfect balance between considering the wellbeing of tenants and the pockets of their landlords. She suggests making three basic, relatively low-cost features mandatory in rentals — fly screens, insulation and ceiling fans. A pack of ten ceiling batts can cost less than $80 at a hardware store, while a do-it-yourself adjustable window fly screen costs less than $30, and a ceiling fan costs as little as $200. With installation costs, a landlord would be able to significantly weather-proof a home for an amount equal to a month’s rent, ultimately lifting the value of their own property. The impact on their tenant’s wellbeing however would be priceless.