Parnell lodge owner given five days to get off church land

Friday, 9 February 2024

Peter van de Wiel has owned and run the Parnell City Lodge since 2010.

The bailiffs arrived at the Parnell City Lodge at around 10am on Friday morning to tell owner Peter Van De Wiel he had five days to get off church-owned land, but he says he’s not leaving willingly and “they’ll have to drag me out”.

Van De Wiel was served the eviction notice requiring him to leave the property vacant by next Wednesday.

Van De Wiel, 78, has owned and run the lodge since 2010, but in December last year he lost a court dispute with the The General Trust Board of the Anglican Diocese of Auckland, which owns the land beneath the lodge, and said De Wiel owed more than $1m in rent arrears.

The two-storey Edwardian style residence in the heart of Parnell, built in 1914 and later converted to a 21-room accommodation/apartment complex, has been providing emergency housing accommodation in mid-2018.

Parnell City Lodge sits on a 1051sqm. property owned by the Auckland Diocese.

Van De Wiel, who lives on site, holds a 21-year lease, with perpetual rights of renewal. The lease was most recently renewed in 2012 and was to be reviewed at seven-year intervals.

In September 2019, the diocese's general trust board served notice proposing a rent increase from $120,000 per year to $512,363. Van De Wiel didn't accept the proposed rent increase and when agreement couldn't be reached the matter went to arbitration.

An arbitral tribunal decided a fair annual rental would be $395,000.

Parnell City Lodge on the corner of Parnell Road and St Stephens Avenue in Parnell, Auckland.

But Van De Wiel kept paying rent at the old rate.

In June 2022, the board served Van De Wiel a notice of intention to cancel the lease, and advised him he owed $825,000 for the period from September 2019.

The dispute went to the High Court and was heard by Justice Michael Robinson in March last year. He delivered his judgment in December. He found little merit in Van De Wiel's arguments, and granted the board's application for an order to possess the 1051sqm property and to cancel the lease.

Peter Van De Wiel’s Parnell City Lodge hasn’t had guests for 2-3 months.

He ordered Van De Wiel to pay rent of $395,000 per year from September 2019 until he vacated the property, and to pay his half share of the arbitration tribunal costs ($31,150).

The judgment was delivered on December 19. The appeal period expired on January 8. The bailiffs arrived the next day.

If you have a problem with a tenant or landlord, you can go to the Tenancy Tribunal for help.

“The bailiffs have just been round here to kick me out. They gave me a piece of paper. I told them to go away,” Van De Wiel told Stuff at midday Friday.

Van De Wiel said he believed the lease he had with the Diocese was still valid and he could not be evicted.

“The rent rise was ridiculous. The church is doing that all over the place. I’ve been contacted by people from all over the country since that last article ran [on January 10],” he said.

He said he paid the former owner of the building and lodge business $1.5m in 2010 and was still paying a mortgage.

Van De Wiel said he had no intention of leaving the property.

“Of course I want to stay. They’ll have to come down and carry me out if they want me gone,” he said.

The lodge had not had any guests for a couple of months.

Information obtained under the Official Information Act from the Ministry of Social Development showed the lodge had received $2,632,691 in about 2300 Emergency Housing Special Needs Grants between January 1, 2018 and September 30, 2023

Board chairman Angus Ogilvie said the trust had no comment to make and “the matter is in the hands of the court”.