Landlords are exploiting international students and tourists in online rental scams, with young travellers crammed in squalid and overcrowded homes. Investigators in the Sydney city area have discovered young Asian and European university students and tourists sleeping in baths, pantries and even fire escapes after falling victim to organised scams on Gumtree and Facebook.
How much would you pay to secure one of 58 beds in a fetid three-bedroom house in inner Sydney?
For the mostly tourists and students crammed into the illegal lodging, the going rate was between A$100 ($110) and A$130.
The tinea-prone showers and cockroach-infested kitchen were thrown in at no extra cost.
It's one example of the illegal and decrepit accommodation the Sydney council's new taskforce is uncovering around the harbour city.
In the three-bedroom home in Ultimo, there were 19 illegally constructed bedrooms. Investigators have also come across one-bedroom flats with 10 tenants, a two-bedroom unit crammed with 16 people.
And then there's the blocked drains full of hair, diffusing putrid smells throughout the squalor.
"Parents send their children to Sydney to study, and we are finding that many of them are living in this totally unsafe, illegal accommodation," Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore said.
"Young visitors ... see wonderful images of the beautiful city of Sydney and they come here and they get accommodation that is on a fire stair or in a bathroom."
Bunk beds were found in this laundry. Photo / City of Sydney
Plastic shower curtains hang from the roof in this make-shift bathroom. Photo / City of Sydney
Last year, a fire engulfed an industrial property in Alexandria, uncovering a 15-person lodging, including shipping containers, caravans and a run-down bus.
The City of Sydney council is compiling a brief of evidence in the case.
However, to get to the bottom of the illegal but flourishing accommodation networks, a former Scotland Yard detective has been hired to head an investigative team to stamp out makeshift slums. Roy Cottam, who has also worked for the Police Integrity Commission, said rent was charged on a per-bed basis, averaging A$130-A$150 for a unit with 10-14 people.
The team has executed 22 search warrants in the past two months, with one network "shut down quite dramatically".
A laundry is decked out with bunk beds. The floor is dirty and strewn with rubbish. Photo / City of Sydney
Police said a crackdown on a property at Pyrmont revealed violent incidents that had gone unreported and tenants in similar cases were sometimes victims living in fear.
"They are being threatened by these people that are running these establishments," Acting Commander Tony Bell said.
