Community Housing Leases 1000 Sq M Box Hill Office

CHL is paying rent of $240 per square metre, per annum to occupy the office described by leasing agents Colliers International and Jones Lang LaSalle as “A-class” and with “a high quality fit-out.”

Agents, developers and planners agree Australia is quietly going through a public housing building boom.

The permits for some of Victoria’s newest commission flat projects were approved without community consultation by former planning minister Justin Madden.  Projects need to be completed by 2012 in order to pocket money offered by redundant prime minister Kevin Rudd to substantially boost supply.

Box Hill in particular is seeing a wave of public housing construction, with one of the largest compounds set to appear at 287 Station Street. Opposite the Box Hill Tennis Club, that large 2840 square metre site was purchased by the Department of Housing last August for $4 million.

Not far away, in Doncaster, a landmark 10-level, 98 unit commission flat tower is nearing completion at 95-99 Tram Road.

Closer to town, 14 per cent (or one in seven homes) within the City of Yarra council area is now allocated as public housing. Construction started recently to build more commission flats on land alongside high-rise towers in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy.

However the efficiency of the lucrative sector is in question, after one service provider recently amended its policy so “clients” earning $80,000 a year, and with $30,000 of savings in the bank, are presented as affordability victims, and are still eligible for taxpayer funded housing.

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Marc Pallisco

A former property analyst and print journalist, Marc is the publisher of realestatesource.com.au.