15 May 2014

Cheaper Gib board not the solution to the housing crisis

Young people trying to get a foot in the door of a new home should be offended by National’s budget which offers a tiny discount on building materials as its only new solution to one of the most pressing issues of the day, the Green Party says.

“Cheaper Gib board and a discount on a few nails must sound like a joke to a young person trying to get in to the housing market,” Green Party Co-leader Metiria Turei said today.

“Young people locked out of home ownership must be asking ‘is this really it? National’s sole solution for the housing crisis is a couple of thousand bucks off the price of a few building materials?’

“Faced with rising interest rates, stratospheric house prices and LVRs that mean they’ve got to save nearly $100,000 to put a deposit on the average home, young kiwis were relying on the Government to come up with something clever and meaningful.

“While an extension to the Welcome home loans is sensible, young kiwis needed new ideas that tackled home affordability head on.

“The Green Party’s Home for Life package would put home ownership within reach of tens of thousands of Kiwi families and would ensure renters had the right to good quality housing and the protection of stable tenancies.

We think that if renters are going to pay off someone else’s mortgage their home should be fit to live in. Our Warrant of Fitness scheme would ensure that it was.

“But even on a day when its own research found most rental homes would fail a basic WOF, the National Government completely ignored this issue.

“Young kiwis got nailed by this budget. Even if those nails were a few cents cheaper,” Mrs Turei said.

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