Council accused of losing building records
It is the stuff of nightmares: lesions on your lungs and a $650,000-plus house rendered unsaleable by a single missing certificate.
A Porirua woman forced from her job by illness and desperate to sell her home has told Stuff she cannot because the council has lost her records.
Sue Mortimer thought she was alone until she got a tip-off from inside Porirua City Council itself.
At the end of 2019, a potential recurrence of cancer in her lungs forced Mortimer to quit her job as a school counsellor in Wainuiomata. She decided to sell her home and build a granny flat on a property with her son in Wellington. Mortimer said that in 1999 she was told by a Porirua City Council inspector she had a code compliance certificate (CCC) on home renovations after multiple inspections.
She discovered in 2005 that the council had no record of this but was reassured by the same inspector that the issue was resolved.
A code of compliance certificate shows building work complies with the building code and has building consent.
Mortimer said when she went to the council to get a LIM report for the sale of her house, she was told there was no record her house was compliant with the code. ‘‘I said: you have got to be f... kidding me.’’
Without a job, she cannot now afford the expensive process of getting the house certified but cannot find any buyers without the certification.
Mortimer said she was told by council staff they regularly dealt with complaints from people told they had gained certification, only to later discover no records of this. When Mortimer asked on social media if other Porirua people faced the same problems, 15 other people came forward with similar stories. ‘‘The phone calls I have had over the weekend were a lot of very distressed people.’’
A woman, who did not wish to be named, said she and her partner bought a home in 2005 and were told by a council staff member that a certificate of acceptance, which shows that unconsented work on a house is up to code, would be placed on the property’s file. This was one of the conditions of purchase and was signed off by solicitors for both parties. However, when they tried to sell the house in 2013, they discovered the council had no record of this certificate.
‘‘The sale, as a result of all of that, fell through and ... we started a fight with the council.’’ She said that after two years of unsuccessful wrangling with the council, they sold the house for at least $80,000 less than it was worth. In addition, she had to pay $40,000 for a report and remedial work showing the house was sound.
Another woman, who did not wish to be named, said when she went to sell her home in 2005, she found a deck was not certified when she had been previously told by an inspector that it was.
‘‘We go to the council and they cannot find our file.’’
She was eventually able to get a copy after getting her lawyer involved, she said.
Council building assurance manager Leonie McPhail said the council was commonly ‘‘contacted by owners who believe they have had their building work signed off but do not hold any documentation, so want to check council records’’. She said 20 or 30 years ago, there was less emphasis on the need for CCCs but this had now changed.
‘‘We acknowledge that there may be various things for an owner to work through to obtain a CCC especially for older building work or to obtain a certificate of acceptance for work that has been done without a building consent.
‘‘Our officers will continue to work with these owners and provide guidance where possible, while being mindful of our obligations, which includes making good evidence-based decisions that protect future owners.’’
The council did not say if it was aware of problems with its records for code compliance.