Wellington needs more houses

Wellington’s house prices are far too high – and for the past year they have only gone up. This will be having all the predictable consequences: families and young people shouldering vastly more debt, more hours at work, more stress, and longer commutes from distant neighbourhoods – if they can sneak onto the property ladder at all.

Why Wellington’s market has shot upwards is something of a mystery. The region’s economy is growing, and debt remains cheap, but the population is relatively static. Perhaps some of the heat from Auckland’s obscenely overpriced housing market has moved southwards.

But there are other crucial factors too, and the powers that be must act more decisively to reverse them. Among them is housing supply. Wellington city, especially, is not building enough houses. It’s true that its topography is often challenging. The recent earthquakes may also slow apartment construction.

But there will always be a large appetite for dwellings relatively close to the city, and there must be the settings to accommodate many more of them.

All of this is fine in theory – and as long as it stays in that form, most people agree with it.

When it shows up in their neighbourhood, however, they revolt. Consider the protests issuing from the northern Wellington suburb of Grenada last week over a 150-home fast-tracked development. This ‘‘extraordinarily large concentration of budget housing’’ would be a ‘‘socially unacceptable’’ addition to the village, the local residents’ association says.

This is an objectionable stance but it is hardly isolated to one suburb. Residents from Khandallah to Kilbirnie have voiced concerns about ‘‘medium density’’ areas promoted by Wellington City Council. Community anger in Newtown threatens an apartment block proposed by Mary Potter Hospice. Some even object to early drawings of Ian Cassels’ $500 million plans for uninhabited, broken-down Shelly Bay.

Of course, there can be some reasonable argument about the merits of each project, including over design. No-one wants badlybuilt blocks anywhere in the city, ripe for becoming slums. It is also reasonable to ask if a cherry-picked ‘‘special housing area’’ approach is the fairest – or whether a broader and less dramatic loosening of the rules across the city might be preferable.

And it’s true, too, that homeowner anxiety is not the only problem plaguing the housing market. Landbanking, tax treatment, low interest rates, strong employment and even a lack of willing developers are all factors.

Yet the sense that Wellington can have its cake and eat it – that homeowners can preserve their neighbourhoods in amber while everyone gently laments those cut out of the market – is a nonsense. There is a trade-off. Each project that is shouted down, or sneered at, or trimmed past viability, is a blow to affordable housing.

In a city where average house prices are north of six times household income, that is not acceptable. High house prices are already affecting the character and diversity of Wellington and opportunities for its people. That urgently needs to change.

Each project shouted down keeps houses out of reach.