North-east Tasmanian business owner, John Brakey, will need to double his workforce at his St Helens restaurant to deal with an influx of visitors over summer.
But with a lack of rental properties and increasing rent in the region, Mr Brakey was worried he might not be able to find staff.
"We've got a full-time population of 2,500 people here, that population swirls to somewhere between 8,000 and 10,000 people over the summer months," he said.
"It's getting the staff for the period of time that's going to become a big issue for us.
"If you're after long-term staff then it can take a period of time for people who are moving to the area to find suitable accommodation.
"For those people who are short-term workers, the problem is even worse — short-term accommodation is really tight."
Report highlights employment problems
A new report has found low residential vacancy rates and skyrocketing rents are affecting employers' capacity to attract staff in Launceston and Tasmania's north east.
The report was commissioned by Everybody's Home, which is a national coalition of housing, homelessness, and welfare organisations.
It looked at the impact Australia's regional housing crisis was having on attracting and retaining workers.
For Launceston and the north east, it showed a 129 per cent increase in job vacancies since March 2020.
It also found rents had risen by 21 per cent since March 2020 and 36 per cent of low-income households were experiencing rental stress.
The annual economic impact of having so many jobs vacant is estimated at $201 million.
The report's author, Angela Jackson, said the lack of rentals and rent increases was deterring people from taking up jobs in regional communities.
"In order for people to move around and to fill vacancies and to fill jobs there has to be housing available," Ms Jackson said.
"The availability of affordable secure housing in regions is really important in terms of labour mobility."
Mr Brakey had 12 employees at his Japanese restaurant but would need about 24 to meet demand.
He said the lack of accommodation did not help.
"It's just another level of uncertainty," he said.
"It all starts to add up after you've had two or three years of tough times through COVID."
Rocky Carosi, who owns the St Helens Accident Repair Centre, said finding suitable staff had been a problem because of a lack of accommodation and rising rent.
"It's pretty much handicapped us here and probably a lot of other businesses that are trying to get skilled tradesmen that aren't often available in the town we're in," he said.
Mr Carosi has had to recruit from other parts of Tasmania and interstate.
"It has happened on at least one occasion where the potential employee was unable to get anywhere to stay down here and decided to stay at their current workplace, which was in another part of the state," he said.
Wide-reaching problem
William Cassidy from the Launceston Chamber of Commerce said the report echoed what he had been hearing from businesses in the region.
"There are multiple sectors that are facing staff shortages and skilled labour shortages and all of them had had interest in people who wanted to move to the region but they just can't find anywhere to live," he said.
"It really is affecting every sector and sectors we don't normally hear this issue from.
"We're even hearing from the accounting and finance industry that there are staff shortages in Launceston and health and community, of course, is the most concerning."
