Editorial: Welcome step up housing ladder

During last year's election campaign, the National Party promised, if it won, to put the Kiwi dream of home ownership back within reach.

Part of its plan was to allow some state house tenants to buy the homes they lived in, while maintaining the state housing stock by reinvesting the money in replacement homes. It has since also committed to building another 1550 state homes over four years.

In February, it announced it would fast-track $124.5 million worth of investment in state housing by upgrading 10,000 homes and adding 520 others before July. This week, it went further.

From September, tenants can approach Housing New Zealand to discuss their purchase options, which might include their also benefiting from the state's so-called Welcome Home mortgage guarantee scheme, which applies to low-income earners buying their first homes.

Usefully, given that more than 4000 people are on the "significant need" waiting list 350 of them in the Wellington region the money made from the sale of property will go to build, not buy, replacement homes.

As with most policy announcements, however, there is devil in the detail. Not all of the state's 68,900 houses will be for sale. Excluded are homes on land subject to Treaty of Waitangi claims or leased from other owners; those not on a single title; and those the Government deems "strategically important".

Almost 3000 of the 5500 tenants paying a market rent for their taxpayer-owned properties are likely to be eligible to buy them if they want to. The remaining 2000-odd properties are not for sale because of the exclusions. Nonetheless, this latest initiative will help to make home ownership possible for some who might never have expected it. The international recession and concomitant fall in property sale prices are helping, too, of course.

Labour is naturally unimpressed. Housing spokeswoman Moana Mackey fears that new state houses built with the proceeds of the sale of existings ones will become ghettos on city boundaries, because only there will land be cheap.

Although Housing Minister Phil Heatley says he plans to "pepper pot" new homes something Labour has always believed in critics might need reminding that first-time homeowners must often start this chapter in their lives in locations that are not as desirable as their parents might be enjoying later in life, or as inner-city rental property.

Forgoing those advantages to own one's home - and this community places a premium on home ownership - is a consideration they must weigh in the balance.

But perhaps the most notable aspect of this policy is its stark difference from that which the last National administration implemented. Then, state houses were sold to tenants and not replaced, and Housing Corporation mortgages were on-sold to financial institutions. The state plainly wanted to get out of housing.

The motivation this time seems different. The Government of Prime Minister John Key, who began his life in a Christchurch state house, seems to be saying that state involvement must be a hand-up only to home ownership, and that those who can afford to move on should do so. It is to be hoped they take the hint.

- © Fairfax NZ News

Newest First

Oldest First

Step Ladders   #1   06:11 am Oct 25 2011

Thanks for this post.. now i know how to save time by using this Ladders.. Bravo!

Ad Feedback