Primrose Sands, half an hour’s drive out of Tasmania’s capital, on the southern beaches, is Greater Hobart’s most affordable suburb.
Key points:
- Once known for its holiday shacks, Tasmania’s southern beaches are now filled with permanent residents
- As the population grows, rentals are becoming sparser and prices are being pushed up — pricing out some long-term residents
- The council says it is challenging to keep up with service and infrastructure demands with a relatively small rate base
At least that’s what it says on paper, with CoreLogic statistics this month showing it had the lowest median weekly rent of $442, compared to a top of $703 in Sandy Bay.
The suburb, part of the Sorell local government area along with neighbouring Dodges Ferry and Carlton, has been known for its beach shack community.
Nat Siggins can remember a time when summer would hit and the population of the southern beaches would triple.
Now, it’s a different story, as a housing crisis pushes Hobart’s residents further out and others move into the area for a change in lifestyle.
The growing pains are hitting the struggling locals, according to Ms Saggins — the community manager at Okines Community House in Dodges Ferry.
She said during the past 18 months there had been a notable increase in the number of people reaching out for food assistance, and seeking help to find a stable roof over their heads.
“People used to move down here because it was more affordable, but now it’s not,” she said.
“Rent nowadays is pretty much the same as it is in Hobart.
“There’s just a lack of availability of houses.
“People are coming here asking us, ‘Do you know of anyone that has a spare room in their house?'” she said, with others struggling to make their mortgage repayments.
“I don’t know how people that are on benefits, like through Centrelink, can afford to rent and live.”
Jessica couldn’t move to Hobart
Jessica Willemse has experienced the challenge of finding a rental in the area first-hand.
She and her husband moved to the southern beaches last year, moving from Launceston to pursue her university studies.
Initially, Ms Willemse said the pair had been hoping to move to Hobart — but it quickly became clear that was not an option.
In the southern beaches, they were able to find a few properties within their price range — but they would be gone before the pair were able to put in an application.
Eventually, they managed to find something — 40 minutes out of Hobart’s CBD.
Even then, almost half of their income is being used to cover rent.
“My husband brings home $950 a week … and we pay $470 a week,” Ms Willemse said, with some casual work she recently secured also helping out.
“And then once we put petrol into that, that’s $100 a week [for petrol] for my husband to get to the job that allows us to pay for those things.
“And then groceries are $120 a week, and we’re sort of getting down quite quickly.
“It’s one of the things we have to weigh up — if we move further away, then those petrol prices increase.
“It makes you question, where do you go next?”
Long-term residents pushed out
Craig Boyd, from South East Salvos, said Ms Willemse’s experience was unfortunately far from unique.
He said a number of long-term residents had been priced out of the area in recent years.
“Everyone’s desperate to stay where they are,” Mr Boyd said.
“There’s a lot of social collateral and social networks in this area that people rely on for their own support, their own wellbeing. So moving out … is desperately being avoided. But unfortunately, people do.
“They’re needing to head up the east coast or down the Tasman Peninsula to be able to secure somewhere.”
He said these moves came with other challenges — like being further away from services.
“A lot of them have been sacrificing access to supermarkets such as Coles and Woolies,” Mr Boyd said.
“The kids have got to fit into a new school, a new community — and the other issue has been a lack of public transport in those areas too.”
‘Constant flow of residential blocks’ needed, mayor says
With Sorell one of the fastest growing municipalities in Tasmania, Mayor Kerry Vincent said the council was well aware of the growing pains being experienced.
He said while there was little the council could do in the short term, it was committed to getting on top of these challenges where it could.
Similar to other growing councils, Mr Vincent said, the challenge was keeping up with the changing demand for infrastructure and services while pulling from what was a relatively small rate base.
“All our existing money is being used to maintain the existing infrastructure,” he said.
“So if we want to go out and build anything new, we have to work very closely with state and federal governments or other funding sources to say, ‘We really need this piece of infrastructure to fit with the growing needs of our community’.”
That takes time and resources, he said — but was something the council was actively doing, alongside encouraging discussions about decentralising public and low-cost housing, and “developing all sensible amounts of land” to promote a “constant flow of residential blocks” opening up.
Mr Vincent said the local government review underway in Tasmania was also going to be vital in the long term.
“We do not have a big enough rate base to be able to do all the things we need to do, without a lot of help from state and federal governments,” he said.