Invercargill housing development on hold for short term

Monday, 25 November 2019

Habitat for Humanity Invercargill general manager Paul Searancke.

A housing development at the Kew Bowl site in Invercargill is on hold until the Government announces plans for its $400m progressive home ownership package.

Green MP Jan Logie visited the city on Monday and discussed housing issues with members of the Southland Housing Action Group.

Green Party MP Jan Logie was in Invercargill on Monday to discuss a range of issues, including housing.

Logie, who was raised in Invercargill, said it was sobering to hear the extent of the housing shortage in Invercargill and how worried people were about how it would get resolved.

The scale of the problem was highlighted by a previous Venture Southland report suggesting the province needed 2800 houses this year to fill the current need - and 480 every year after that for five years to meet the anticipated mounting demand.

* Southland property value growth the highest in the country

* Kew Bowl housing development a welcome prospect

* Habitat for Humanity buys Kew Bowl site in Invercargill

* Invercargill City Council finds 'preferred party' for Kew Bowl site

* Invercargill City Council considers freeing up land amid 'housing crisis'**

Logie said she was told building work would not start at Kew Bowl until the developers had certainty from the Government on how it would incentivise the building of affordable houses.

'They are not going to start building if they think that means the Government's funding for new developments will only go towards new projects.

'If they have already started that means they rule themselves out of being eligible for that.'

Habit for Humanity Invercargill bought the Kew Bowl site, located off McQuarrie St in south Invercargill, this winter, with plans to reduce Invercargill's housing shortage.

Habitat for Humanity Invercargill general manager Paul Searancke said since it purchased Kew Bowl the Government had formed the new housing entity Kainga Ora and announced the $400m package around progressive home ownership.

'The package is to help people into their first homes, effectively,' Searancke said.

'We are waiting to see if we can actually access any of it, what we can use it for and how it's going to assist people.'

The money was not a gift, it would have to be repaid, but if Habitat could access any of the fund it would speed up the Kew Bowl development Searancke said.

He expected the details be become clearer in December when a paper was due before cabinet.

'We are waiting for some more detail around that progressive home ownership model because that could work better for people in our community.

'We don't want to miss out out on anything by pre-empting it when we could score something out of the Government, just to be really blunt.'

Habitat wanted the Kew Bowl site to be used as an affordable, mixed-use housing development to provide a range of housing from seniors to young families – to help combat widespread housing shortages in the city.

There were expected to be between 24 and 29 sections with a mixture of duplexes and stand alone homes.