Housing NZ site for sale in PM’s electorate
A Housing New Zealand-owned ‘‘super-block’’ in the prime minister’s Auckland electorate is being sold by the Government after years of stalled development.
The 8094-square-metre site in the central Auckland suburb of Mt Albert is being sold by Housing New Zealand through Bayleys Real Estate.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is the MP for the Mt Albert electorate and owns a home with her partner Clarke Gayford in the neighbouring suburb of Sandringham.
The site at 33 Asquith Ave was previously occupied by three residential blocks of flats but Housing NZ demolished these in 2015.
Progress on the site stalled for years with Housing NZ eventually detailing plans to build 40 homes – 20 state homes and 20 market homes expected to be completed mid-2019.
Labour repeatedly promised it would not put state homes up for private sale, but Housing Minister Phil Twyford said it might sell a small number of underperforming state house stock.
Housing NZ would retain part of the site for 20 state houses, some of which were already under construction, he said.
The whole site has a capital value of $12.75 million but Bayleys Mt Albert agent Jock Kooger said that figure was irrelevant because there were so many variables to take into account, including the fact that part of the section was retained by Housing NZ.
‘‘Because there are so many permutations of how the five blocks could be purchased, it is impossible to put a set number on their value either individually or as a total package.’’
Housing NZ subdivided the site into five blocks of residential land, with each of the blocks – on the corner of Burch St – containing between two and five sections, each between 127sqm and 213sqm in size, Kooger said.
They could be bought individually, as one ‘‘super-block’’ or in any combination of lots.
The blocks were being sold with resource consents already in place for the building of fourbedroom townhouses ranging in size from 131sqm to 150sqm.
The area has Special Housing Area designation under the Auckland Unitary Plan.
Kooger said it was extremely rare to see bare residential land holdings of this size so close to the central city come up for sale in a suburb renowned for its character bungalows – many dating back to the early 20th century.
‘‘As the lots will come with their own freehold title and resource consent already granted, buyers can choose to apply for building consent or apply for any changes to the current designs to suit their requirements.’’
Because there were so many possibilities of how the five blocks could be purchased it was impossible to put a value on the site, he said.
Tenders for the site close at 4pm on November 21.
Housing New Zealand asset development general manager Patrick Dougherty said the development was not part of the KiwiBuild programme but part of the Auckland Housing Programme (AHP).
The AHP started in June 2016 and will deliver 5200 new state homes and about 12,800 new affordable and market homes over 10 years.
The sale of the 20 market sites would enable Housing New Zealand to build more state houses in other high demand parts of Auckland, he said.