By RISHAB JAIN, JACOB GAMBLE and ED WU

Singaporean international student Filment Ho remembers the horror of being homeless in a foreign country earlier this year.

The 22-year-old was left to couch surf with friends for 20 days, after his lease at his student accommodation in South Yarra ended on February 1.

"I stayed with one of my workmates," Ho says. "Yeah, so they let me stay in a room for a bit."

He was required to vacate his student housing, despite being unable to secure a new place before his lease ended. 

"In my student accommodation, the rent was about $349 per week last semester ... So it was very expensive then," he says. 

"They told me for next semester that it was like a discounted rate or a special rate. It was $420 per week, which is too crazy.

"Now the prices went up to like $450 weekly.”

Melbourne’s vacancy rate for rental properties was 0.9 per cent in April 2023, research from Domain revealed last month.

With less rental history, typically lower levels of wealth and greater dependence on casual income, young people often struggle to access rental homes compared to their older counterparts.

Disability and youth intersectionality advocate Isabella Fantasia says the lack of available rentals and her financial difficulties from living on a disability support pension had forced her to live in a “toxic” environment at her parents’ home.

“The pension doesn't pay me enough to be able to live independently in a way that I would actually be comfortable with,” Fantasia says.

The 22-year-old works two jobs in addition to receiving the pension, and says the constant rejection on rental applications is “tedious”.

“Rental prices keep rising. Cost-of-living keeps rising. The area I want to live in, which is where all my disability support is, is getting harder and harder to find available rentals."

Fantasia says her lack of rental experience and accessibility needs add further challenges to finding a suitable home in her preferred area of Melbourne’s outer-eastern suburbs.

“Rental experience is really hard to come by unless you have a friend you can move in with,” she says. “If you're a person with a disability or a minority or you have these differing needs, and need to live by yourself, it's near impossible to actually find a place to rent.

“I’m essentially trapped at home with my family because I can’t move out at all.”

Monash University Master of Architecture student Aleez Vasaya was also affected by the shortage of rentals. 

He says he was unable to find an apartment before the lease on his last place ended. 

“It was difficult to rent a property at the start of 2023 as the demand was too high. I eventually found a place after looking for a month,” Vasaya says.

He paid $279 per week for a single room before shifting to his new place in Prahran, where his rent has increased by $40 per week for a two-bedroom apartment due to high demand for the property.

Farah Farouque, director of community engagement at Tenants Victoria, says state and federal governments need to invest more in social housing to alleviate the supply shortage impacting people on lower incomes.

“We need to see housing differently — as an essential service rather than a mode of investment,” Farouque says.

With Tenants Victoria receiving more than 10,000 enquiries a year, she says more investment in tenancy services and closer regulation of the private market could help set a “fair formula” between renters and landlords.

“We need better regulation of Airbnb in areas close to universities to make the best use of the properties, especially when students struggle to find a place to live.” 

Earlier this year, the Reserve Bank of Australia increased the cash rate by 3.6 per cent to the highest level in the last 11 years, which has increased the price of many rental properties. Real estate owners are paying higher mortgage due to the rise in interest rates, resulting in high rents for tenants to even out the fallback.

Monash University senior lecturer in the Department of Banking and Finance John Watson says he is surprised to see the dual challenges of rapidly rising inflation for basics such as electricity, gas and food and the increasing cost of rental properties.

"Renters are already facing an uphill battle given Australia has a shortage of ‘available’ accommodation," Dr Watson says.

"Now we are observing [that] investors are passing on to them the extra cost of mortgages held on these properties."

Dr Watson says the rising interest rates, migration levels, return of international students and investment trends are heavily influencing the rental market and will continue to do so in the coming 12 months or longer. 

These influences, he says, have led to an increase in the number of applications for properties.

"Property management groups have been inundated with applications for rental properties, with some reporting as many as 20-30 applications for a single property," he says.

"Before COVID, on average, the number of applications for a rental property was in the low single digits."

The overall number of listings offered for rent last December decreased by 19.5 per cent from the prior year, marking the worst decline since 2003, according to PropTrack.

The "influx of international students" at the start of the year made things worse for people looking for a rental home during that period. In January The Guardian reported that some 50,000 Chinese students came to Australia after the Chinese Government banned online learning for tertiary students studying overseas.

Dr Watson says the tide of increased rental prices will continue with the “influx of international students”.

“There is a huge gap between supply and demand of rental properties due to a lot of international students entering the country for education purposes.”