By Matt Dunn
A FOUR year battle to secure a group of Inverloch residents a guaranteed place to see out their retirements has failed.
The residents of Inverloch’s Sunny Sand Residential Village were offered a five year lease, which has about two years to run, and while they own their own dwellings, they do not own the land.
The Housing for the Aged Action Group recently lost a four year battle to have the laws changed to extend minimum lease agreements. The State Government was not willing to come to the party.
“It’s pretty tenuousand it’s something we’re trying to address. Security of tenure is a key thing for anyone, but particularly older people, who hope to live out their retirementin peace,” HAAG tenancy adviser worker Jeff Fiedler said.
“The dwellings are built on stumps and it could cost a lot of money – up to $50,000 - to relocate them. And if you’ve invested all of your retirement savings in the home, you may not have a lot left over. Some people may not even be able to afford to move it.
“The only other option may be to sell it, and in our experience, when places have closed like this it becomes a fire sale. You have all sorts of sharks coming in offering residents half what their places are worth. People come out of it really badly.”
He said the collapse of such villages led to other issues.
“We’ve also got a housing problem then. What do people do then? If you’ve only got $70,000 then you can’t really buy anything else. It’sone of the few options some people have to buy a home and have that sense of ownership at an affordable rate,” he said.
“We want minimum term leases introduced in these sorts of places, so people are offered a 50 year lease to protect them for the duration of their retirement. This is the sort of guarantee people need.
“People are investing a lot of money in these places, sothey really deserve that commitment, I suppose. There’s only a couple of years to run on that lease – they’re about three years into a five year lease. It’s hoped the owner will renew that lease, but even then, if it’s renewed for another five years, people will worry about what will happen at the end of that five years.”

Mr Fiedler said there was “some additional anxiety because of the desalination plant.
“There’s a lot of people moving into the area and potential for anyone with land to cash in on it,” he said.
Mr Fiedler has met twice with the residents.
“Just about all the residents came along, which demonstratesto us the level of concern that was there. The security of tenure issue is their central concern,” he said.
“Everything else flows from that. If you’ve got security of tenure, you feel free to speak up about other things. If you don’t have security of tenure you’re afraid on a number of levels. You feel that you could be asked to leave if you get on the wrong side of the owner.
“People are happy there. They get on well with the owner. There’s no dispute as such, but it’s really an issue of people having the right to live there for the rest of their lives. Places like Sunny Sand are an example of a place where people will always fear for the future.”
Member for Bass, Ken Smith was equally critical of the arrangement.
“There’s no security of tenure there at all. It may be that the guy who owns it may have no intention of selling, but it’s not good for the residents, because they want to feel secure in the life they’ve got,” he said.
“They’ve made the move, they’ve probably sold their houses –and I wouldn’t really call them moveable dwellings – because they’re built upon stumps and they’ve got a garage attached to them.
“For them to come under the caravan parks and moveable dwellings legislation is just not right. There are huge numbers of people around Victoria who are in exactly the same position as those people at Inverloch and there’s got to be some very positive changes made to the legislation.”
Mr Fiedler said there were no indications the owner would not maintain the village as “an ongoing concern,” but no guarantees he would.
The owners of the village refused to speak to The Star about their intentions, saying only that the residents were happy living there.
Neither were residents keen to speak.

MATT DUNN
REPORTER
The Great Southern Star, Leongatha