Huge sell-off of state houses planned

Housing New Zealand plans to sell or redevelop almost a third of its 69,000 houses in a 20-year plan to meet changing needs and bring private homeowners into state housing enclaves such as Mangere and Otara.

reconfiguration, outright disposal or disposal and replacement".

It plans to "exit low-demand areas and premium suburbs in high-demand areas" and reduce its stock of three-bedroom houses that are unsuitable for those in the greatest housing need, who include elderly and disabled individuals and large families.

It also wants to reduce the percentage of state houses from well over half to a maximum of 30 per cent in high-concentration areas such as Mangere, Otara, Mt Roskill and Tamaki in Auckland, and parts of Porirua and the Hutt Valley in Wellington.

Those suburbs were built 40 to 50 years ago when most state house tenants were low-income workers, but chief executive Dr Lesley McTurk said the corporation's growing focus on housing people with high and complex needs meant they were now "concentrating that disadvantage".

She said the corporation also wanted to give existing state house tenants a chance to move out into private rentals or to buy their own homes.

To read the full NZ Herald article, click here

Posted: 7 Jul 2010

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