TV antennas in a WA rental: who pays, and how fast it has to happen
The owner pays. Under the Residential Tenancies Act 1987 (WA) the lessor must keep the premises in a reasonable state of repair, and an antenna that existed at the start of the tenancy is part of the premises. The tenant pays only if they broke it. It is not an urgent repair: WA keeps the 24 hour and 48 hour timeframes for essential services and genuine urgency, and television is neither. Budget $130 to $280 for a repair and $340 to $750 for a replacement, and expect a 7 to 14 day turnaround.
Obligations table: antenna and TV work in a WA tenancy
Situation, who wears it, the timeframe the law or normal practice sets, and the realistic 2026 cost in the Bunbury area.
| Situation | Who is responsible | Timeframe | Typical cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Antenna was working at the start of the tenancy and has now failed | Lessor | Non-urgent repair: a reasonable time. Most managers work to 7 to 14 days | $130 to $280 |
| Antenna blown loose, hanging over the gutter after a storm | Lessor | Treat as urgent: risk of injury and of further damage to the roof | Make-safe $180 to $320, then repair |
| Water entering the ceiling at the antenna penetration | Lessor | Urgent. Water damage escalates daily | $130 to $280 to reseal, plus any ceiling repair |
| No antenna existed when the tenant moved in | Nobody is obliged. It is an improvement to negotiate | None | $280 to $750 if the owner chooses to fit one |
| Tenant damaged the antenna, cable or wall plate | Tenant | Repair promptly, cost recoverable | $130 to $280 |
| Tenant wants a TV wall-mounted | Tenant, with written consent from the lessor | Answer the request in writing. Prescribed minor modifications cannot be unreasonably refused since the 2024 reforms | $200 to $480 plus make-good at vacate |
| Tenant wants an extra TV point in a bedroom | Tenant, unless the owner wants the improvement | None | $120 to $240 per point |
| Corroded coastal antenna, still working, near end of life | Lessor, as planned maintenance | Before the next winter, not after it fails | $340 to $580 marine grade |
| Shared or master antenna on strata common property | The strata company, under the Strata Titles Act 1985 (WA) and the scheme by-laws | Per the by-laws and the council of owners | Funded from levies, not by the individual owner |
| Access to carry out the repair | Lessor or agent gives written notice | Not less than 72 hours and not more than 14 days, at a reasonable time | Nil, but a failed access is a wasted $130 callout |
| Routine inspection finds a corroded head | Lessor to schedule the work | Inspections: 7 to 14 days written notice, maximum 4 in any 12 months | $340 to $580 to replace before it becomes a storm claim |
| Antenna or wall plate damaged, found at the vacate inspection | Decided by the property condition report | Bond disposal, and the Magistrates Court if it is disputed | Cost of the repair, if it is beyond fair wear and tear |
General information for WA tenancies in 2026, not legal advice. Consumer Protection publishes the current rules. Our prices are on the pricing page.
Urgent versus non-urgent, in WA terms
This is the distinction that decides whether a tenant is entitled to push, and whether an owner is exposed.
The WA Act splits repairs into urgent repairs to essential services, other urgent repairs, and ordinary repairs. Essential services are the ones a household cannot function without: electricity, gas, a water supply, hot water, and a cooking, heating or laundering appliance supplied with the premises. Those must be arranged within 24 hours. Other urgent repairs, meaning anything that is not an essential service but that risks damage to the property or the safety of a person, get 48 hours. Everything else is an ordinary repair, to be done within a reasonable time.
A television antenna is not an essential service by any reading, so a tenant who quotes the 24 hour rule at a dead antenna is on the wrong page. But two antenna scenarios genuinely do fall into the other urgent repairs bucket, and property managers should treat them that way: an antenna or mast that has come loose and could fall on a person, a car or the neighbour’s roof, and a roof penetration that is letting water into the ceiling. Both risk damage to the property, both get worse quickly, and both are cheap to make safe compared with what they turn into. Our emergency page covers exactly what to tell a tenant to do in the first hour.
If the owner does not act
A WA tenant can give written notice of the repair, and if nothing happens they can apply to the Magistrates Court, which can order the work and compensation. For genuinely urgent repairs there is also a path for the tenant to arrange the work and seek reimbursement, subject to the conditions in the Act. None of that is a good outcome for anyone. A $180 make-safe booked on the day beats a court application on any measure.
What the minimum standards do and do not cover
No Australian state or territory lists a working television antenna as a minimum rental standard. WA’s standards work is aimed at things like electrical safety, security, ventilation and mould. Separately, and importantly for owners here, WA requires mains-powered smoke alarms and at least two residual current devices at the switchboard before a property is sold or rented. Those are the ones that will actually stop a tenancy or a settlement, and they are worth confirming while you have a technician in the roof space.
Notice, access and how to avoid paying for two visits
The most expensive antenna repair is the one where nobody could get in. Half of the wasted callouts we see across Bunbury, Eaton and Australind rentals come from a work order that never reached the tenant.
- Give proper written notice. For repairs and maintenance in WA that is not less than 72 hours and not more than 14 days, at a reasonable time of day. Text messages are convenient but keep something in writing on the file.
- Say whether the tenant needs to be home. For antenna work the answer is usually yes for at least part of it, because every TV has to be retuned and signal-checked at the set. A roof-only make-safe can be done without access to the house.
- Tell us how many TVs and where. Three TVs across two floors is a different visit to one in the lounge. It is the single most common reason a job runs over.
- Send the symptom, not the conclusion. No signal is not a diagnosis. All TVs dead since Saturday’s storm, antenna looks bent, is a diagnosis, and it means we arrive with the right hardware on the van instead of booking a second visit.
- Flag pets, gate codes, lockboxes and parking. A ladder and a roof kit will not fit through a side gate you cannot open.
- Batch the portfolio. If you manage several properties in the same coastal pocket, book them together. Travel is a real cost in the South West and it is the part we can genuinely discount when the jobs are on one run.
Vacate inspections and the property condition report
The property condition report written at the start of the tenancy is what decides an antenna argument at the end of it. If it records a working antenna and three functioning TV points, and the vacate inspection finds a wall plate ripped out of the plasterboard and a coax cut behind the entertainment unit, that is a tenant cost. If it says nothing about the antenna at all, the owner will struggle.
Three practical habits fix this permanently. Photograph the antenna from the ground and each wall plate close up at the start of every tenancy, note whether every TV point actually carries a signal rather than just that a plate exists, and record the antenna’s apparent age and condition. It takes four minutes and it converts a future dispute into a two-line email.
Fair wear and tear is not chargeable in WA, and salt corrosion on a coastal antenna is textbook fair wear and tear. A tenant in Dalyellup cannot be charged because the sea air ate the elements over five years. A tenant who drove a screw through the lead-in mounting a shelf, can be. If a wall-mount bracket was installed during the tenancy, the make-good expectation should already be in the written consent: normally the bracket comes off, the holes are patched and the wall is repainted to match, which runs $120 to $300 depending on the wall.
Repair or capital improvement: the tax line
General information only. Your accountant decides how it applies to your situation, and the ATO rental property guidance is the authority.
- Usually a deductible repair: re-aiming an antenna that has drifted, replacing a corroded F connector, resealing the roof penetration, replacing a failed masthead amplifier on an otherwise sound system, reterminating a wall plate. These restore the asset to its previous condition and typically sit in the $130 to $280 band.
- Usually capital: a complete new antenna, mast and lead-in at $340 to $750, adding TV points that were never there, or a first-time installation. Replacing an entire item rather than restoring part of it is the classic capital marker.
- Initial repairs are capital. Work needed to fix a defect that already existed when you bought the property is not an immediate deduction, even if you do it in the first month. Buy a Withers rental with a dead antenna and the replacement is treated as part of the acquisition, not as a repair.
- Second-hand assets: since 1 July 2017 investors generally cannot claim depreciation on previously used depreciating assets in residential rental properties. That rule catches more inherited fittings than owners expect.
- Keep the invoice detailed. An invoice reading antenna work $580 is unhelpful at tax time. Ours itemises antenna, mast, bracket, cable, connectors and labour, which is exactly what your accountant needs to split repair from capital, and what an insurer needs if a storm is involved. See the insurance claim page for how those two overlap.
What we would tell an owner not to spend money on
- Do not replace an antenna that needs a retune. Roughly a third of the rental jobs we are sent as replace the antenna turn out to be a $130 retune, a loose connector or an amplifier plug pack somebody switched off. Always pay for a diagnosis first.
- Do not pay the $60 to $90 same-day premium for a vacant property. Nobody is watching television in an empty house. Book the standard slot.
- Do not fit a standard antenna on a coastal rental. On the ocean and estuary side of Dalyellup, Bunbury and Australind, a cheap head buys you three years and another callout. The marine-grade version costs about $120 more and lasts two to three times as long. Over a ten year hold that is not close.
- Do not add TV points to every bedroom on spec. Tenants stream on their own devices. One good point in the lounge and one in the main bedroom is where the value stops. See extra TV points for what each one costs.
- Do not run a satellite service on a metropolitan-coverage property. If terrestrial reception is fine from the local transmitter, a dish is an ongoing cost and another thing to corrode.
For an owner planning ahead, the coastal maintenance schedule sets out the check intervals that keep a rental antenna alive for a decade, and TV wall mounting covers the bracket and make-good side. If you manage properties outside the City of Bunbury, the service areas page lists how far we travel.
Frequently asked questions
Who pays for a broken TV antenna in a WA rental?
Is a dead TV antenna an urgent repair in Western Australia?
How much notice is needed to get into the property?
Does the owner have to install an antenna where there was never one?
Is a new antenna a deductible repair or a capital improvement?
Can a tenant wall-mount their own TV?
Work orders for Bunbury rentals, quoted in writing
Send the property address, the symptom and the access arrangements, and you will have an itemised fixed price back within one business day.
Managing rentals across Bunbury and the South West?
Itemised invoices, tenant-friendly booking, and jobs batched on one run to keep travel costs down.