Posts Tagged ‘housing crisis’

Motels are not state houses

Written By: - Date published: 9:22 am, March 28th, 2017 - 39 comments

It’s almost as if deliberately running down state housing stock doesn’t make the need for homes magically go away – who could possibly have predicted that?

Spinoff series – rent week

Written By: - Date published: 12:51 pm, March 27th, 2017 - 58 comments

While much of the coverage of the housing crisis focuses on buyers, the situation facing renters is just as bad. Last week The Spinoff ran an excellent series on renting in NZ: “It’s getting desperate out there”.

Andrew Little’s speech on housing

Written By: - Date published: 8:40 pm, March 16th, 2017 - 47 comments

Excellent speech from Andrew Little in Parliament yesterday, on the government’s willful blindness to the housing crisis.

A tenant’s tale

Written By: - Date published: 8:11 am, March 12th, 2017 - 198 comments

“And when I saw that article in the NZ Herald this morning , in light of whats been happening to so many New Zealander family’s having to sleep in cars and the like over the past few years – I thought ”FUCK IT !!”… Im going to say something.”

Household debt

Written By: - Date published: 11:47 am, March 8th, 2017 - 93 comments

The IMF warns that our household debt is far too high, as desperate tenants start raiding the Kiwisaver accounts to pay the rent.

The social damage wrought by homes as commoditites

Written By: - Date published: 7:04 am, March 4th, 2017 - 82 comments

A recent UN report highlights the waste of treating homes as commodities. It should sound awfully familiar in the NZ context.

English reckons the collapse of NZ’s housing is “a good problem to have”

Written By: - Date published: 7:18 am, March 3rd, 2017 - 36 comments

In every case a failure to plan, a failure to deliver, and a glib attempt to fob off the victims of his government’s failure.

You can’t afford a house because of – plants!

Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, February 27th, 2017 - 58 comments

I’m used to hearing some pretty pathetic excuses out of the National government. But this will really take some beating.

Two big policy fails

Written By: - Date published: 10:24 am, February 24th, 2017 - 10 comments

This is what you get with a hasty, reactive, “top down” policy process.

Nick Smith screws up again

Written By: - Date published: 9:21 am, February 22nd, 2017 - 20 comments

We should probably just schedule this as a monthly post.

English “will be taken down by housing”

Written By: - Date published: 2:40 pm, February 14th, 2017 - 67 comments

In the middle of a housing crisis “Housing New Zealand documents obtained under the Official Information Act show that there are nearly 2,500 empty state houses, more than 500 of which have been empty for over a year.”

Watch Bill English lying through his teeth on housing

Written By: - Date published: 2:03 pm, February 13th, 2017 - 36 comments

English is a less convincing liar than Key.

Rudman on Nats’ total housing fail

Written By: - Date published: 10:24 am, December 21st, 2016 - 196 comments

Rudman: “The Prime Minister, in his role in charge of Housing New Zealand, and Smith have spectacularly failed to solve Auckland’s housing crisis over several years.”

Dire warnings of the bleeding obvious

Written By: - Date published: 7:57 am, December 1st, 2016 - 14 comments

Warnings from the government and the Reserve Bank that first home buyers are taking on too much debt. Prices are too high, wages are too low, interest rates are rising. These warnings are effectively telling the average first home buyer to give up.

Housing “affordability” blowout

Written By: - Date published: 11:31 am, November 29th, 2016 - 9 comments

Andrew Little was on RNZ this morning talking housing affordability. “The amount people are having to borrow for their first home has increased 43 percent in the last two years.”

There is no housing crisis

Written By: - Date published: 8:41 am, November 8th, 2016 - 22 comments

Paula Bennett has announced a new spend of $300 million to address the non existing housing crisis. But the announcement appears to be little more than a refinancing of Housing Corp and an admission that the Government should have stopped taking Housing Corp dividends years ago.

The main risk to New Zealand according to John Key

Written By: - Date published: 9:15 am, October 6th, 2016 - 59 comments

John Key is pretty good at providing media commentary on what problems New Zealand faces.  But is he any good at addressing those problems?

Land banking – National gives up on housing crisis

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, August 29th, 2016 - 29 comments

As the average Auckland house price hits $1 Million, the Special Housing Areas fail, and Real Estate agents openly promote land banking, what does National do? Why, they give up, of course.

Nick Smith commits to raising average wage to $250,000

Written By: - Date published: 10:55 am, August 27th, 2016 - 37 comments

Great news everyone! On The Nation this morning Nick Smith committed to raising average NZ wage to $250,000!

The Spinoff: Housing crisis costing Nats

Written By: - Date published: 7:23 am, August 27th, 2016 - 14 comments

The Spinoff: “Lose the top of your party vote in Auckland, with Labour making ground, and the picture for the general election in 2017 looks like, walks like and quacks like a crisis.”

Chart of the day: The “building boom”

Written By: - Date published: 9:48 am, August 26th, 2016 - 119 comments

building-consents

Foreign buyers estimated at 29%

Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, August 25th, 2016 - 75 comments

Most of the media has reported the Government’s “3%” spin on the extent of residential property purchases in NZ going to foreign buyers pretty uncritically. There have been honourable exceptions, and yesterday property editor Anne Gibson in The Herald joined them.

Fleeing Auckland

Written By: - Date published: 12:34 pm, August 24th, 2016 - 71 comments

Spinoff: “The Spinoff/SSI survey reveals the extraordinary impact of housing crisis on residents of New Zealand’s biggest city – and the extent to which Aucklanders blame foreign speculation.”

Andrew Little on housing

Written By: - Date published: 10:16 am, August 23rd, 2016 - 109 comments

Andrew Little: “John Key will give you all the excuses you can stomach for his failure to stabilise house prices and boost incomes but the truth is clear: if we want to change the path we’re on, we need to change the government.”

Tents warehouses and driveways

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, August 19th, 2016 - 64 comments

Tents and warehouses have been considered as emergency housing. Working people sleeping in cars are looking for driveways to rent. Say – has anyone seen John Key lately?

Affordable housing fail – we can’t rely on the private sector

Written By: - Date published: 9:20 am, August 17th, 2016 - 55 comments

To the complete surprise of no one, private sector developers have largely waited out the “affordable houses” requirement in the special housing areas. Another National failure.

Immigration jobs and housing

Written By: - Date published: 12:46 pm, August 11th, 2016 - 88 comments

Until we sort out our housing and unemployment problems it is surely time to reign in NZ’s currently record levels of immigration.

Labour’s Kiwibuild is popular

Written By: - Date published: 9:49 am, August 9th, 2016 - 81 comments

More good news for the political left in the fine print of yesterday’s Newshub-Reid Research poll.

Nats contradicting each other on panicked infrastructure policy

Written By: - Date published: 8:40 am, August 8th, 2016 - 29 comments

From Newshub:
nickbillyesno

Al Jazeera on NZ homeless – watch it and weep

Written By: - Date published: 7:02 am, August 6th, 2016 - 291 comments

Al Jazeera: Once a pioneer of the social welfare state, New Zealand now has over 40,000 people who are homeless, forced to live in their cars and in garages as a result of rapid house price and rent rises and a shortage of social housing. Al Jazeera … charts the country’s fall from and egalitarian society to one with deep divisions of wealth

Government puts 15% tax on foreign house buyers

Written By: - Date published: 7:11 am, August 4th, 2016 - 32 comments

No, not our government. Though as the average NZ house price just hit $600,000, and Auckland just short of $1m, they really should.

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