Mike's Minute: Is the rental market in trouble or not?

So, who is right? 

"The rental market is like musical chairs". That was a headline yesterday. Landlords are offering grocery vouchers and incentives to sign up for rentals. 

But then headline number two; "Even the middle class are struggling to pay rent". 

Story number three was a report I read by JB Weir about wealth transfer, which is actually a story in itself. But the upshot is we are the 7th wealthiest country on Earth. If you do the median, i.e. half above and half below, we are the 5th wealthiest. 

So if we are so wealthy, how come we can't afford rent? 

If we can't afford rent, how come they are offering grocery vouchers to lure us in? 

The answer, of course, lies in the specifics of each story. 

The middle class line came from a unionist they called an "economist" in the story, so a man with an agenda. He cited a teacher on $60,000. Teachers don’t earn $60,000 unless there are one of the new, young ones and let's be frank, if you are new and young and on starting wages you should be flatting. 

As for the voucher story, well that is a reflection of the good news. Rentals are not rising the way they were because of supply. Thousands more houses are on the market and there are more houses than punters. That sort of supply and demand equation is good for the consumer. 

So, if you drum up the worst case scenario, guess what you will find? A problem, closely followed by a headline. 

But what of this wealth transfer? It was an interesting report showing billions is changing hands as the boomers die and the kids get the inheritance. 

Women are disproportionately benefiting over men, it will carry on well into the 2040's and is a reminder that we are not in fact the squalid, broke, backwater that many would make us out to be. 

We might be a low paid or "wage economy", but we are not as economically divided as some would make out. We are not broke and through things like housing, vast sums have been amassed. 

And it's currently being bequeathed and left to others. 

The trick is to read the detail, not fall for the headline. 

Can some not afford rent? Yes. 

But it's not the norm. That's your story. 

But then that doesn’t make a good headline. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.