North Shore Times (New Zealand)
State houses set for million-dollar areas
Some of the million-dollar suburbs on the North Shore are set to get more state houses, as part of the Government’s response to the city’s housing crisis.
Housing New Zealand is set to build 34,000 houses over the next 10 years in its Auckland Housing Programme.
As part of this programme, 190 new social houses and 54 marketpriced houses are planned for the North Shore in the next three years, general manager of asset development Patrick Dougherty said.
Takapuna is set to get 25 social houses and 54 market houses in the programme.
The average sale price of a three-bedroom house in Takapuna is $1.34m, according to Barfoot & Thompson’s June suburb report.
Other areas set to get social houses include Beach Haven (56 houses), Birkdale (55), Totara Vale (18) and Sunnynook (6), although Dougherty said the final numbers could change as development investigations are done.
These houses are additional to the 1200 houses planned for Northcote, set to be built over the next six years. A third of these will be social houses, a third sold on the open market and a third ‘‘affordable’’ at under $650,000.
Dougherty said stage one of the Northcote development, where 20 existing homes are being replaced with 59 new homes, is set to be finished in October.
While the housing develop- ment is good, there is concern about what happens to the families currently living in the state houses about to be replaced, Labour’s Northcote candidate Shanan Halbert said.
Many of these families faced moving out of the North Shore, with no guarantee they would be moved back into the area, he said.
‘‘They’ve had to relocate families out west, for example, with no commitment to come back to the North Shore community and it’s quite intergenerational there.
‘‘One of the original commitments of the Government was to ensure that these communities weren’t broken up but they’ve back-tracked on that,’’ Halbert said.
Housing New Zealand has a process for tenants who need to relocate due to development, including asking them where they would like to live, how many bedrooms they need and any specific housing needs, Dougherty said.