Luck and Leaps of Faith: Navigating an emergent shared informal economy for renting in Australia

The proliferation of peer-to-peer online platforms has facilitated the increased conversion of private dwelling spaces to exchangeable room based commodities that disrupt yet coexist with traditional private rental practices. With global reach, peer-to-peer platforms act as a direct yet informal route into an increasingly unaffordable and commodified rental market from networked ties that are reliant on trust and luck. Although shared living has existed since the beginning of time it is argued that peer-to-peer platforms provide a virtuous cycle for the informal room rental market to flourish yet be concealed from the regulatory practices that govern the formal rental sector. The everyday practices of negotiating the room rental market and the return to ideas of ‘modern trust’ promoted within a shared economy discourse bring to the fore the institutional asymmetry emerging between the informal and formal private rental sectors for those seeking housing solutions whilst living on a low income.