r/shitrentals

Hey everyone, looking for some perspectives or experiences from anyone who has pushed back on a rent hike where the landlord explicitly admitted they are trying to cover their own holding costs.
We rent a 2-bedroom granny flat/secondary dwelling (no driveway or off-street parking) in Glenmore Park (Penrith NSW area). We currently pay $540/week, which is already right at the very top of the market for a secondary dwelling around here.
Our PM/landlord originally wanted to hike it to $580, and after we sent through local comps, they replied with a "final offer" of $570/week. In their email, they explicitly stated:
"The proposed increase also reflects the significant increase in property ownership costs over recent years, including higher mortgage interest rates, increased insurance premiums, council rates, maintenance expenses, and broader inflationary pressures."
They basically admitted in writing that the hike isn't based on market value, but rather on their own balance sheet and interest rates.
The Market Reality vs. Their $570 Ask: We pulled active listings and recent rentals across Glenmore Park and surrounding 2750/2745 suburbs (South Penrith, Jamisontown, Cranebrook):
Glenmore Park 2-bed granny flats: Typically listing around $500–$520/wk (e.g., listings on Wattlecrest, Clearview, and Bujan St).
South Penrith 2-bed granny flats: Range from $470–$520/wk (e.g., Parker St, Christine St, Smith St).
What actually goes for $570/wk out here: Modern multi-level 2-bedroom townhouses with dedicated garages, or full 3-bedroom standalone houses ($570–$580/wk).
Under Section 44 of the Residential Tenancies Act 2010 (NSW), NCAT looks strictly at market comparability, amenities, and state of repair—a landlord's mortgage rates or private financial liabilities are not legal grounds for an excessive rent increase.
We’ve declined the $570 offer, informed them we won't sign a new fixed-term lease, and confirmed we’ll transition to a periodic (month-to-month) agreement when our fixed term ends on October 4 while we look for new accommodation by the end of the year. We asked to keep the rent at $540/wk until then to avoid taking it to tribunal.
My questions for the sub:
- Has anyone had a landlord or PM explicitly cite their mortgage/interest rates in writing, and did you use that as primary evidence if you went to NCAT or negotiated down?
-If you challenged an above-market hike on a secondary dwelling/granny flat, how did NCAT view the lack of dedicated parking/shared lot compared to standard units?
-Any tips on handling the PM while on a periodic lease while we shop around for a new place?
Would love to hear if anyone’s gone through a similar situation recently!

I’ve lived in this place for six years and we left it in really good condition. We took plenty of photos and videos as proof. Now the agent is suddenly claiming $5,000 in “repairs” for mould, blinds, a tiny carpet stain and a rusty oven. It all looks like normal wear and tear. They even tried to fix a blind themselves, made it worse, took photos and tried to blame us. Luckily the new tenant is a friend and took a photo when she installed the faulty blind.

The agent forgot to dispute the bond, so the full amount was released to me. Now they’re trying to chase the damages through VCAT. It’s frustrating because every inspection before we moved out, they said the place was in great condition. If anything was actually wrong, we would have fixed it.

Has anyone dealt with agents like this? How did your VCAT hearing go?

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I have recently moved to Brisbane and I have applied for a studio apartment with all bills included. This being my first time applying for single occupancy I am just needing some clarity & understanding on a few things.

So electricity is paid for but it is metered at 5kwh a day, with daily use going over that to be charged to me. I am just wondering if this is normal? I have done some research and 5 kWh is absolute bare minimum & considered to not be enough for one person's daily use. Which generally ranges around 6-10. To anyone that is currently living in a single occupancy rental id just like to know if you're daily use is also capped at 5kwh. And if so what did your power bills look like?

Especially in terms of summer, im going to be using that air con daily for sure, which means I would well and truly go over the 5kwh daily use everyday.

Any advice or understanding on this matter would be greatly appreciated, on the lease agreement they said that people in this building are living comfortably with 3kwh of electricity per day. Which is well BELOW minimum according to my research. And then they said they added 2 more kwhs to make it 5kwh use per day to make sure its MORE THEN ENOUGH for tenants.

The caps are in the lease agreement as well.

Any advice would be appreciated. I am just needing understanding on this to see if this is the norm.

Thank you,

UPDATE: If anyone else is currently in this situation with single occupancy could you please let me know if this the norm? And what your bills look like if you go over that threshold. Thank you :)

I dont know how but we won.

We get our bond back in 7 days if they dont appeal.

I think I feel happy?

I can post the evidence and how I went about it if y'all want? After the 7 days.

I have succeeded for the first time in my life.

Fuck property managers

Hi first time poster here so forgive me for any errors
I had an end of lease inspection for a unit I had been living in for 7 years. I spent about a month of going back and forth moving and cleaning. This included a weekend where my mum and aunty came and helped me deep clean every over a weekend, I also hired cleaners and a gardener for last weekend.
I’ve gotten an email from the property manager accusing me of leaving the property in worse condition than when I got it, including implying I’ve broken the air conditioner, stolen a mirror and smoked inside (all which are categorically false). She’s also wanting to know what caused “gray matter” on the walls. I have my theory about this which is that due to the cornices being constantly separated from the walls (unit built in the 70s), dust has consistently fallen through cracks in the ceiling- which has been exacerbated by possum and mice living in the roof. She has also NEVER raised this as an issue after 7 years worth of inspections.
I’m not really sure what to do here. Any advice would be really appreciated
Thanks.
Edit: Will also add that the property is already up for rent online for $50 a week more and is apparently available to rent from tomorrow. Photos I know she took from the inspection have been used in the advertisement.

I thought I would share my absurd story for entertainment. Unfortunately it’s my reality.

So today my landlord (owns the building, doesn’t live far from me) starts banging on my door saying his wife is sick and needs a lift home. I don’t have a car, so I offer to call her an Uber. He says can’t my parents come get her instead?? Sir, no.

Offer an Uber or an ambulance again, both refused. Then he asks if she can just… lie down in my apartment. For context it was 11am and their son “can’t” pick her up until 7pm because he’s working. So the plan was for a woman I barely know to occupy my living room for EIGHT HOURS.

I said absolutely not, I have things to do today. Somehow she still ends up on my sofa (with her shoes on, on my sofa) while this gets sorted, and I am dry heaving from the smell in my own apartment. I call the son myself since the husband is asking me to. Son flatly refuses to leave work to get his own mother. The husband has to negotiate with son on the phone in front of me while I’m standing in my own home like a hostage negotiator for a family drama I did not sign up for.

End result: she gets moved along eventually and lands on my elderly neighbour instead, who is currently unwell herself. So a sick old woman ends up looking after another sick woman because two grown men couldn’t be bothered.

This unfortunately is not a one off boundary crossing.

I just wanted to change and do some uni work. Instead I became an unpaid, unwilling nurse/negotiator for my own landlord’s family. Send help, or at least send tissues for my sofa.

I hope you have all been thoroughly entertained.

Hey all.

My wife and I recently finished up a 2 year lease that was terminated because the homeowners wanted to move back into the property.

We asked the REA for their reccommended cleaner and paid just over $1000 to have the property cleaned for end of lease. We also paid around $800 for a gardener (also previously recommended by the REA) to get the property looking good for our exit.

We handed the keys in yesterday morning (Tuesday) and claimed our bond. Yesterday evening at about 6pm, we received the exit report from the REA and an accompanying message that identified issues needed to be "urgently" addressed because the owners are moving back in on Thursday or Friday.

The list of issues relate to both the cleaning work and gardening work done and are all pretty minor. Some examples include food crumbs in a drawer, some cat litter caught in the grout in a bathroom, and weeds in a veggie patch.

I've let the REA know that the cleaners will go back around to address issues and gave them permission to receive a copy of our exit report to ensure everything is taken care of. I've also asked the REA to get some quotes from gardeners/handymen to address anything in the gardens (e.g. weeds, removal of some green waste).

My question: Is it reasonable for the REA to expect us to get everything done by Thursday afternoon (tomorrow)? My wife and I both work full time and I'm also still recovering from a broken shoulder; it's really not feasible that we can rush to get this done for them ourselves. We've captured via email that we're both happy to get the issues rectified, but that the provided timeline is unrealistic given our circumstances.

My gut feeling is that these issues are "urgent" for the REA because they messed up in giving the owners a move-in date so close to our exit date. But I've not really had an experience like this so would love some input.

Thanks!

Hi,

So suddenly the hot water in my building is going cold/lukewarm at night so we emailed the building manager who told me to speak to my PM, then after I've emailed the PM he comes back and says one of the buildings hot water pump is broken so during peak times it's not pumping the water around properly and leading to lukewarm showers at night. So obviously this is an urgent matter they are going to fix right away right? Wrong it took them 3 weeks to fix and the building managers advice to me? Take earlier showers to avoid peak times. I have a 2 year old who showers at 7:30 before bed every night so it's just not possible for him to get in the bath at 5. He also is telling me because it's going to cost $12k to fix they have to get 3 quotes and the last one is taking a long time to come. He kept saying the $12k thing repeated the price a bunch of times, like "annnnnd? I need hot water bro I don't give a fuck how much it costs the owners, our rent is $2500 a month for a fucking shoe box and amenities are part of what I pay for"

Anyway apparently it's getting replaced on Thursday so that's good, but I've pretty much had to send an email every few days to find out when it was going to be and why its taking so long. I even emailed the PM again and he emailed the owners courp too.

So I'm wondering if I should emai my PM and ask for a rent reduction for the month. How much is fair if so? 3 weeks of unreliable hot water was fucking shit but the building manager is kinda acting like I'm the only one who cares and have therefore cost the owners heaps of money or something. I suffer from thinking everything is my fault but also having an intense need for fairness so I struggle to let things like this go because 3 weeks? Seriously wtf.

Thoughts?

I privately (no real estate involved) rent a two bedroom unit in NSW and recently my roommate moved out. However, a week before she moved she broke the Landlord's washing machine. It filled with black water, locked the doors and would get stuck in the middle of a cycle and wouldn't spin out the excess water from the clothes so it leaves you with soaking wet, dripping clothes.

My landlord has said that he is going to make me and my ex-roommate pay for the repairs (even though I wasn't the one who broke it) as he said "I'm not Santa, I not spending money on fixing everything" but I don't even know if he will be able to contact her for the money as she moved out of state and I'm scared the repair invoice will fall on me to pay...

My lease doesn't mention any of the appliances and only mentions how much rent I need to pay (which covers my wifi and utilities) and an agreement to have my pet lizard in the unit.

Is this legal for him to do? I'm scared I will be saddled with a big bill I don't have the money to pay for. This is my first rental experience and so far it's been terrible...

My previous post

https://www.reddit.com/r/shitrentals/s/JpeHxykDQa

So we are moving out early and organising a lease transfer to make it easier for ourselves. That way we are not hostages of their final inspection and claiming our bond over stupid things.

However, the agent insists that because all renters are moving out, this won't be a transfer but a lease break, subject to final inspection and fees.

I already emailed her the exact legislation and sent her screenshots of my live chat with Tenants Vic where they literally said "your REA is wrong*.

We had 2 applicants and the agent called me yesterday to say they were both rejected because of visa expiring too soon and not being able to afford rent.

Ok... So I do more inspections and find another 3 applicants, one of them I know meets all the affordability criteria, and they applied straight away. My move out date aligns perfectly with their move in date, happy days!!

The agent is insisting on making this a lease break and giving new renters a 12 month lease, no doubt so they can charge more rent (even though I'm advertising the house at my current rent amount) and so they can take my bond.

I spoke to CAV and was hoping they could intervene but all they did was give me the same legislation Tenants Vic gave me, and told me to email the agency's OEC. And if that doesn't work, apply for a VCAT order to force the transfer.

Who's to say the new renter would be willing to wait until a VCAT decision and miss out on other rentals, besides they would get the clear message this REA is cooked so they would give up.

I sent the email to OEC today saying we would rather not have to apply for vcat and if we do we will lodge a formal complaint against the agency at CAV and Estate Agents Resolution Services.

Honestly I'm not sure why I'm posting this, I'm just so tired and stressed and bloody sick of REAs being this scummy.