People living and working in regional Australia are coming up with inventive ways to deal with the housing crisis. Business owners forced to commute more than 400 kilometres to work in shark bay in WA have decided to truck in pre-built housing.
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TVTranscript
00:00 Housing shortages in the holiday destination of Shark Bay are putting pressure on local businesses.
00:07 Liam Ridgely and his sister Jade commute nearly 400km from Geraldton to work for their family business.
00:14 If my parents have got guests there, I've got to stay in the caravan.
00:18 Housing shortages are so bad in Shark Bay, would-be renters are placed on a waiting list.
00:23 And all we can do is just reassure them and make them know that yes, when we do have something available, we'll be in contact with them.
00:28 There are more than 50 short-term rentals in Shark Bay, more than 10% of the local housing.
00:34 The state government recently introduced a $10,000 incentive to encourage holiday homeowners to switch their properties to long-term rentals.
00:42 The impact that it will have is introduce a level of regulation around short-term accommodation that is probably lacking in a lot of jurisdictions at the moment.
00:51 But the Ridgely's are still worried the housing shortage will restrict their ability to expand their business.
00:57 The first question we ask potentially employees is do you have accommodation and usually their answer is no.
01:02 Because of labour shortages, the Ridgely's are building a home in Geraldton and transporting it to Shark Bay.
01:08 And that's sort of one of the things we have to take into consideration that we may have to put staff housing there just so we can get staff.
01:16 Building housing for staff and trucking it in could offer a lasting solution to the housing crisis in this piece of paradise.
01:23 [BLANK_AUDIO]