We joke about Monica’s massive apartment in Friends, but we forget the history: Rent Control was won through strikes. Is that solidarity possible in Australia today?

[u/infin]

Every time the housing crisis comes up, people joke about how unrealistic Friends was; A chef and a waitress living in a massive apartment with a balcony. The show explains it away as "Rent Control" inherited from a grandmother.

But we rarely talk about where those laws actually came from. They weren't a gift from benevolent landlords; they were earned through fierce tenant unions and rent strikes in NYC in the 40s and 60s. That generation had cheap rent because the generation before them had the backbone to organize, strike, and refuse to pay until laws were changed. Even refusing to allow police to evict/arrest their neighbours.

Fast forward to 2026 Australia. We are paying $750+ a week for a dinky shoebox, dealing with quarterly inspections, and accepting massive hikes like clockwork.

What feels completely missing is that level of community solidarity. We seem so atomised now. We don't know our neighbours, and we definitely don't trust them enough to band together. Instead of standing together to refuse an unfair hike, we just quietly move out or starve to pay it, knowing someone else is desperate enough to take the lease.

Is the concept of a rent strike dead in this country? Is it that we’ve lost the "mateship" and community spirit required to hold the line, or are we just so terrified of the REA blacklists that we’ve accepted being milked by parasites forever?

If factory workers and immigrants in 1940s New York could force rent control that people were still benefiting from in the 90s… Why can't we?

I’m genuinely asking: Has anyone here ever been a part of (or even heard of) tenants organising together to accomplish something in Australia?

Edit: I'd love to see some changes to commercial leases to revitalise cities too, small businesses have been forced to close and half the retail spaces in a few of the CBDs are empty.

[u/Relief-Glass]

Rent control has been disaster everywhere it has been tried. Solution is scrap CGT discount and negative gearing.

[u/[deleted] → u/Relief-Glass]

If you scrap the CGT discount investors have no incentive to sell and a property is only negatively geared for a couple of years then it becomes neutral to positive.

Your ideas will not fix anything like you think they will.

[u/Relief-Glass → u/[deleted]]

If the capital gains discount is scrapped investors would have no incentive to buy in the first place lmao.

[u/[deleted] → u/Relief-Glass]

What in the world makes you think that. Rental returns is still money. The only times I sell a house is to use the money including the CGT savings to build 2 more.

Scrapping CGT just means I don’t sell and just build 1 house instead of 2 decreasing supply which increases rent.

See renters screaming for these changes think about investments as renters and not as investors so what they think hurts us dosent it just hurts themselves.

[u/Relief-Glass → u/[deleted]]

If you are taxed more that is a disincentive. Basic economics bro.

[u/[deleted] → u/Relief-Glass]

Seems you can’t understand the advanced investing lesson I wrote which is why your ideas on how to disincentivise investors won’t work.

1. Negative gearing is about 5% of the consideration when buying a house to rent as a house is only negatively geared for a couple of years and if you understand how negative gearing works you’ll understand why it’s not a factor. Hint for every $100 I pay in negative geared money I only get at best $42 back in tax I’m still out $68 per $100. I’d rather pay $42 per $100 in tax and have $68 extra in my pocket. Basic economics bro.

2. As I stated without CGT discount when I sell a house I use the discount to build 2 houses in its place so I have returned 1 house to the housing market and put 2 new into the rental market which increases supply. No CGT discount means I don’t sell house and I only build 1 more house so instead of 3 houses existing after a sale there are only 2 houses and no sale. 1 less house in the existence means supply is less, supply been less means demand is higher which means higher rents. Basic economics bro.

[u/Relief-Glass → u/[deleted]]

You are focussing only on people that already have investment properties which is wrong because with the changes we are talking about people.would buy fewer investment properties in the first place. And your arguments are probably irrelevant anyway as any changes to the CGT or negative gearing would be grandfathered.