At least 160 renters in the Victorian town of Rochester, whose homes have been destroyed by major flooding sweeping Australia’s south-east, have now been served with eviction notices.
Most were evacuated during the massive weather event and remain in temporary accommodation where they have now been given 24 hours’ notice to “vacate” their properties.
The owners of Pristine Property Management, the biggest independent real estate agent in the town, have evicted at least 160 people, living across 80 properties.
But they say they have legally had no choice.
Some of the tenants have hit back, saying their homes were still livable, and 24 hours was an unreasonable time frame to process an eviction when they had just been hit by a natural disaster.
Tammy Gavin lives with her four children, aged 21, 19, 16 and 14, and a 13-month-old grandson. She had to be evacuated from her house in Rochester by the SES and spent three nights in hospital because of stress. When she was discharged, she received an email telling her she had 24 hours to vacate her home.
“We have all power, we have electricity, the toilets are working, bathrooms are working. Everything is working in the house,” she said.
“I have not stopped cleaning this house so it’s clean for us and the real estate agent thinks I’m leaving, but not without a fight on her hands.
On Thursday the emergency relief centre in Bendigo, which was housing about 280 people from central Victoria, will shut its doors, with residents from Rochester moving into caravans.
Gavin said they could go there if they got desperate, but after staying in a motel for a few nights, they just want to be in their home.
“A motel isn’t a home. I’m still paying rent – I’m $900 in front,” she said.
“They offered me a refund and I said no.”
She said there was confusion about when they would need to vacate. The owner has been to the property and said they can stay until the repairs start – while the estate agency said they had to leave straight away but could possibly stay in a caravan on the property as the repairs were done.
“I’ve even asked, can we put a caravan in the driveway while they’re doing the repairs? The real estate said it would be OK, but we can’t cook inside,” Gavin said.
“Bottom line is, I’m not leaving.”
Sue Harrington is struggling to find a home for her father, Clive Renahan, 82, after he was also given 24 hours to vacate his unit, which was destroyed in the floods.
After the flood swept through the town, Renahan was called by his landlord and told to leave the property, which he has lived in for eight years.
The eviction email was then sent to Harrington, but no one will tell them when or if he will be able to go back to his home.
“I think they haven’t been fair to him,” Harrington said. “He doesn’t understand it.”
“Especially at his age, his health is not good. I can’t imagine how he would feel. He will always have a home with me, but everyone wants their own home.
“And to not know when you can go back, that’s the hard part.”
Renahan has been put on the Salvation Army waitlist for emergency housing, and they will try to find him a new rental if he cannot return.
“We’re just worried he’ll have nowhere to live,” she said.
“If we could find out if he would be allowed back in there, that would ease the burden.”
Kristine Vance, director of Pristine Property Management, said they were only evicting tenants because they were legally required to do so.
“We’ve finally got our head around how many properties that we’ve had to vacate tenants in and it’s about 80,” Vance said.
“We’re trying to make contact with the renters before we serve that notice to vacate, just to soften the blow.”
Vance said they have been criticised on social media for handing out vacate notices, but it was not something the agency wanted to do.
“The legislation is really clear if the place is uninhabitable, where we have to give a notice to vacate. So when you’ve got black water gone through the property, you’ve got gas, electricity, all those sorts of issues. For us not to act is totally irresponsible, immoral.”
“There’s still just a handful we’re trying to get out. All of them have been issued notices.”
Vance said where they could they had been handing them out in person.
She said they would put the same tenants back into their houses when it was safe to do so.
She said she had contacted the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, who advised that evacuating tenants amid a natural disaster was the right thing to do.
A spokesperson for REIV said, according to the Residential Tenancies Act, where the premises have been rendered unsafe, the agent should keep renter safety in mind and issue a notice to vacate.
“From what we understand in this particular case, rent payments were stopped in time and bonds returned in full – the agent doing what they can to assist the renters in difficult circumstances,” the spokesperson said.
“Unfortunately, the current situation does not leave many options for renters, agents or rental providers.”
