Healthy Homes Standards – Landlords & All The Blasted Red Tape

2023 has kicked off to an excellent start.

We are getting quite a few more inquiries from landlords that have typically done their property management, DIY, and their rental properties are coming up for rent.

🚩 I’m finding there’s resistance; they want an easy fix; she’ll be right trying to cut corners; they want it sorted.

🚩 But at the same time still resisting meeting healthy homes standards, which is tenancy law.

🚩 They don’t take it seriously with healthy home standards. They know they should comply, and renting is much more complicated nowadays.

💲Landlords that don’t meet their obligations under the healthy homes standards are in breach of the Residential Tenancies Act 1986. They may be liable for exemplary damages of up to $7,200.

Healthy Homes Standard Third Party Assessment

We recommend getting an independent third-party assessment completed.

You can fill out a compliance statement online through Tenancy Services.

Landlords need to understand the fact of going online and doing their reports that they are making a declaration.

Landlords need to be honest and understand and educate themselves on what’s required with healthy homes.

Like heating and what kilowatts are required and measuring room size; there’s a heating calculator you can use online.

You’ll need to go to the property to check all windows open and close properly and check for window gaps or cracks larger than 3mm, which may cause draughts and that all downpipes flow into the storm water.

Also, you will need to ensure the insulation meets the standards, including a moisture barrier for a house with an enclosed subfloor space.

Check Out Healthy Homes Tenancy Services

But really, why would you not spend a couple of hundred bucks, goodness me. For a professional independent third-party healthy home assessment? 

➡ It’s just really important; of course,  you’ve got health and safety to look at, smoke alarms, expiry dates, and all this stuff has to be declared on all new tenancies these days.

➡ What is the insurance excess, what type of insurance you covered for, and are the chattels the same excess as the house insurance?

🚩 So getting these wrong can be huge; I think we’re going to find a down the track, you know, some landlords are going to get caught big time with hefty fines for taking this too lightly or for lack of understanding.

Unfortunately, it is what it is, and yes, it can be a pain in the backside.

There are, in my opinion, grey areas with healthy home standards in some instances.

Such as, say, with a house built 30 or 40 years ago, downpipes didn’t always flow into storm water back then.

Water is not running under the house, and it’s still getting away okay onto concrete, but it still won’t comply, which is silly, and in some cases putting in new drainage can be big money.

Most rental properties comply with little cost, and you might have to put extra heating in or close some window gaps and things like that.

But in most instances, it’s not huge cost, and of course, there are benefits for tenants.

With sash windows, we’re finding with older homes; landlords prefer a wooden joiner to close windows properly so that the sash windows swing correctly and the latch closes nicely and tight. It’s done once and done right.

We’ve had tenants mention that it has made an enormous difference.

So if you’re heating that house, now they’ve got the windows closed and secured correctly making it much easier to heat, and, of course, more economical for the tenant.

If you want some help with your rental properties, Call Richard on 027 249 8295 today.’ 📞

Check out out property service to see how we can help you’