SYDNEY — Like most Sydney rental house seekers, Tanakit Phaopin is used to long queues. With vacancy rates currently hovering around 1.7% in Australia's biggest city and 1.3% nationally, rent inspections often attract dozens of would-be tenants who have scrambled to manage the volume.
“Everybody lines up and they let four people in at a time,” said a university student and part-time swimming instructor at a recent inspection in Sydney's Inner West. “It's very stressful, there's a lot of competition.”