HOUSE RENTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 3, 3 July 1940, Page 6

HOUSE RENTS

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —Hearing so much these days about equality of sacrifice, one wonders when something is going to be done about house rents. The general public has had its income further reduced through the War Budget, thereby increasing the cost of living, and yet one is still expected to pay rents out of all proportion to the value of the premises rented. Certainly we have the Fair Rents Act, but of what use is that? Immediately one tenant leaves a house or flat the rent is advanced 5s or more for the incoming tenant, and the latter has no means of finding out what his predecessor had been paying and so enable the Fair Rents Act to come into operation.

' House rents at the present time in Wellington are exorbitant, and with decreased incomes due to the increased taxation, it is an impossibility for the average working man to obtain a house or even a flat at a, rental that will enable his reduced income to give him a fair standard of living.

What the Government should do is to assess all rents during the war period on a fiat-rate basis, Le., at so much per room and at a much lower figure than the £1 or 30s per room asked for at the present.—l am, etc.,, HOUSE HUNTER.