[Sparklechick]

On the News last week they announced that Housing NZ spent over $21m on fixing and maintaining their houses. That doesn't surprise me considering the state of the Housing NZ house next door. For those of you outside NZ, our government provides extremely cheap houses for those people on benefits etc so that they don't end up living on the street. Quite often Housing NZ builds brand new houses for them and there's a waiting list of about 2500 families (could be more than that actually) waiting for a house to be provided for them.

Unfortunately some of the tenants take this for granted and run the house into the ground so when they leave (often owing rent) Housing NZ has to come in and spend months cleaning the places up, then they let the place out again for it to happen all over again.

I've even heard that they'll take batteries out of smoke detectors!

SO ... this is the email I've sent to numerous people and it will be interesting to see if anything happens.

I've recently bought my first home in Royal Heights Massey and have been having ongoing issues with the Housing NZ tenants since I moved next door.

The first lot of tenants left the house in an absolutely disgusting state. When Housing NZ went to clean the place up they even had a "Warning, Health Hazard" sign up on the window. The lawns had NEVER been mowed. The tenants had left the place with windows broken, open and lights on. There was rubbish everywhere. Housing NZ spent some time and money on fixing the place up and another family has moved in.

This family is not much better than the previous one. Housing NZ has moved a 6 person family into a tiny 3 bedroom house, although I think a load of extended family live there also because there's always at least 4 cars parked out front and there's at least 3 kids I've seen there. Most of their furniture is in the back yard covered with tarps. They've been there almost a month now and the lawns haven't been mowed, the lawn has been torn up by cars driving over it and the amount of rubbish accumulating is increasing every day.

Every week I am woken by the sound of drunken fighting going on and I don't feel safe in my own home at this time.

Sometimes, it's terrifying and I feel for the children of these families. This is the first time I've lived near Housing NZ tenants and I'm not impressed. They don't seem to have any respect whatsoever for the places they live in and I don't see why Housing NZ continues to help these families when all they do is abuse the privilege. As far as I can tell Housing NZ hasn't visited the property once since they've moved in.

I'm surprised that Housing NZ are putting up brand new houses ... after seeing how my neighbours treat the house next door I wouldn't think that brand new houses will be treated any different. A complete waste of taxpayers money. I'll definitely be more careful when buying my next property that's for sure.

Just my thoughts from a fellow ratepayer

[Lina]

Nicely done, Sparkle, I'll second that for you!

[redfiredragon67]

Agreed Sparkle you did well & I've previously experianced exactly what you are saying. I am a housing NZ tenant, I've lived at the same address for 6 years now & don't plan on moving anytime soon. The house I occupy is a lovely 3bedroom place. It has become my home & I treat it with a great deal of respect. The lawns get mowed & the housework gets done (etc). I love my home & am greatful to housing NZ for providing it.

So you see Sparkle... there are some good news stories out there too... just thought you should know.

[Sparklechick]

redfiredragon67 ... I know there are good tenants out there as well, it's these lowlifes who are making a bad name for the good ones. They should be inspected more regularly and if they're breaking the rules then they should be struck off the Housing NZ register. There are loads of families looking for subsidised housing so why let the abusers get them ....

[redfiredragon67]

Yes... I agree with you on that one Sparkle. It only takes one bad apple to spoil the barrell (?sp).

[sarahk]

I'm happy to work with any tenant who thinks they're getting a bad deal - and that includes with Housing New Zealand. The law has set up mechanisms to protect both the landlord and the tenant and it seems that good tenants are woefully unaware.

The bad tenants, as with most things, are very aware of their rights but not of their responsibilities.

[redfiredragon67]

Agreed.

[Sparklechick]

So it's been about 2 weeks since I sent letters to almost everyone I can think of and nothing has been done about the place next door. It's just as filthy as it was 2 weeks ago. Housing Corp would obviously rather spend money cleaning these places up after the tenants move out than inspecting the properties and demanding tenants clean up after themselves.

[sarahk]

You can issue a landlord with a 10 day letter to fix a problem in your property - if the problem is not remedied in 10 days you can take them to the Tenancy Tribunal for mediation and get an enforceable order.

[Sparklechick]

Erm, but I'm not the tenant OR the landlord. Housing Corp (the landlords) obviously have done nothing!