Tenant to be evicted

It is alleged police has been called at least three times to the property.

Allegations of verbal abuse, rubbish thrown over a fence and tagging of a neighbour's property have caused a family to be evicted from their Housing New Zealand house.

A Bay of Plenty man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, contacted the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend with his story about abuse directed at his family from his next-door neighbours, a family who were tenants of a Housing New Zealand property.

After being contacted by the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend, Housing New Zealand said it would evict the tenants due to threatening and abusive behaviour.

Problems started after two of the offending family's younger children became friends with the man's children. But the friendship ended after the man confronted his neighbour about the behaviour of one of the older children.

"It started ... when my wife and I were taking our kids [out]. We had a car coming towards us, swerving, so I gave them the fingers. They turned around and chased us, the neighbour's son was in the passenger seat.

"Later, I knocked on the neighbour's door and asked the father if I could have a word to his son about how what he was doing was dangerous. I explained what happened to the father and he started losing his nut at me.

"After that, he started threatening me and throwing rubbish and green waste over, tagging the fence. I videoed them throwing rubbish over the fence.

"They've thrown bongs up over the fence as well but when I told Housing Corps they said it was a police matter."

The man believed his neighbours had "breached every part" of their Housing New Zealand agreement many times and believed it was "disgusting" they were still allowed to live in a state house.

His wife was scared to be alone in the house after the neighbour had taken to calling her derogatory names such as "slut" and "whore".

He had called police "three or four times" and estimated he had contacted Housing New Zealand about 40 times in the past 18 months.

Housing New Zealand regional manager Darren Toy said the tenants were being evicted because of their abusive and threatening behaviour.

"Ending a tenancy is a last resort - we will always try and work with our tenants to help them keep their tenancy, and assist in resolving problems with neighbours as they arise. However, we do not tolerate behaviour that interferes with the peace, comfort, privacy or safety of those living nearby," he said.

"We will terminate tenancies where it is necessary, as we have done in this case."