Covid-19 temporary measures announced
Yesterday, the Queensland Minister for Housing and Public Works, Mick De Brenni MP, made a public announcement of the impending Covid-19 temporary arrangements for residential tenancies in Queensland, including:
- legislation and regulations will be introduced to Parliament on Wednesday and expected to pass shortly thereafter
- Residential Tenancies Practice Guidelines will be published in the coming days to give Landlords, Agents and Tenants guidance on how to deal with rental reduction requests, evictions, break lease and entry requirements during the pandemic
- tenants will need to show EITHER at least a 25% reduction in income due to the pandemic OR a reduction in income sufficient that they will be spending more than 30% of their income on rent to qualify for the temporary relief measures introduced
- where a tenant meets the income threshold, break lease damages will be limited to only 1 week
- the Government is leaving it up to the parties to negotiate whether any decrease in rent is simply waived or will become a debt repayable in instalments in the future
- mandatory conciliation is required where Landlords and Tenants cannot agree to rental reductions
- both Tenants and Landlords will need to give details of their income under the Practice Guidelines recommended negotiations and process
More detail will be known once the legislation, regulations and Practice Guidelines are published by the Government. Landlords and Tenants who work with Personalised Property Sales and would like to discuss further can call Tony on 0401 902 628.
In the meantime, we recommend that all Landlords and Tenants alike watch the Minister’s announcement below in full and read the information and scenarios available on the Queensland Government’s Covid-19 Residential Rental Hub. Further information will be provided to our Landlords and Tenants when it comes to hand via this blog, Social Media sites and email alerts.
