Increase Accommodation Supplement rates as of April 2018, maintain grants for insulation and continue growing emergency housing and funding community-based initiatives to end homelessness.
Amend residential tenancy legislation to make it easier for landlords to test and evict for meth, to hold tenants liable for careless damage and to prosecute landlords tenanting unsuitable non-residential properties as residences.
LABOUR: labour.org.nz
Restrict purchase of existing homes to citizens and permanent residents. Tax speculators who on-sell houses for profit within five years. Shut down negative gearing tax breaks.
Create an Affordable Housing Authority to partner with the private sector to build homes faster. Deliver 100,000 affordable homes for first home buyers over 10 years through KiwiBuild, half in Auckland.
Grow the construction workforce through Dole for Apprenticeships and three years of free post-school education.
Remove Auckland's urban growth boundary and free up density controls. Help fund new developments with infrastructure bonds.
Make Housing New Zealand a public service with no dividend requirement, halt state house sales and build 1000 state houses a year.
Enforce rental property standards with a Healthy Homes Guarantee. Increase accommodation supplements and help insulate or heat 600,000 families' homes. Adopt the Cross-Party Homelessness Inquiry's recommendations.
Expand Maori home ownership support programmes and make it easier to get loans to build on Maori land. Give those on a main benefit or superannuation a winter energy payment.
NEW ZEALAND FIRST: nzfirst.org.nz
Establish new state agency to acquire land for Special Housing Areas. Provide government assistance to first home buyers.
Make non-resident non-citizens ineligible for home ownership except where genuine need is demonstrated. Offer low-cost government finance to local authorities for new elderly persons' housing and public rental housing projects.
Provide superannuitants with electricity discount.Establish new Housing Commission to develop a wide-ranging New Zealand Housing Plan. Offer tax breaks to landlords who upgrade rental housing.
Amend the building consent process for faster approval of more affordable housing. Require better building quality.
Encourage prefabricated houses and smaller more affordable houses on smaller sections.
THE MAORI PARTY: maoriparty.org
Introduce a Minister for Maori and Pasifika Housing.
Develop National Housing Strategy which takes into account the specific rights and interests of Māori under Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
Establish Housing Sector Committee within the first three months of the next Parliament to co-design 25-year housing strategy.
Stop the sale of land to non-citizens.
Introduce a target to end homelessness by 2020.
Introduce compulsory rental home warrant of fitness scheme and review bond refund system to make it fairer for renters. Simplify rental subsidies.
Cap rents on social housing stock and review every five years. Boost government investment in social and affordable housing and plan better so home-building keeps pace with demand.
Introduce "rent-to-buy" options and "equity financing" for first home buyers.
Reintroduce low-interest Maori Affairs loans. Implement the Pathways to Home Ownership approach to assist whanau to achieve housing goals. Remove barriers that make it difficult to develop multiple-owner Maori land.
Subsidise installation of solar panels and water tanks in low income and isolated communities.
GREENS: greens.org.nz
Build 10,000 rent-to-own homes for low-income earners.
Build another 5000 homes to sell to community housing providers, helping them purchase through partial Housing New Zealand funding they'll re-pay. Give providers access to funding from government-backed housing bonds.
Enable Housing New Zealand to build 450 new state houses in year one by retaining its dividend and tax, with state house sales halted.
Allow student loan holders to defer repayments to save for first homes.
Make residential fixed-term tenancies three years by default with existing tenants given the right of renewal when the lease ends.
Abolish leasing fees. Stop tenancy notices shortening for property sales, and limit rent increases to yearly with pre-agreed calculation formula.
Apply capital gains tax on all homes except family homes. Halt negative gearing. Restrict land sales to citizens and permanent residents.
Establish a rental homes Warrant of Fitness scheme. Update energy efficiency standards and reinvigorate insulation schemes. Subsidise low-income families' winter power costs.
Alter planning rules to rein in sprawl.
THE OPPORTUNITIES PARTY (TOP): top.org.nz
Tax house owners on home equity in line with the tax reform approach that all income accrued on capital and wealth should be taxed. Re-distribute this revenue to below-average income earners through tax cuts.
Phase in this policy, reducing excess demand for housing and the incentive to speculate on land prices, encouraging land bankers to develop land and increasing the housing supply.
Make it easier for tenants to stay in properties long-term by restricting eviction conditions to non-payment of rent or property damage.
Gift Housing New Zealand stock to not-for-profit organisations to expand the supply of social and affordable rental housing. Review current accommodation support payments.
Introduce rental Warrant of Fitness. Expand grant system for low income households' insulation to cover electricity use, funded with proceeds from the increased price of carbon under strengthened Emissions Trading Scheme.
Improve building standards.
ACT: act.org.nz
Act's policy includes removing large cities from the Resource Management Act, creating separate urban development legislation, prioritising land supply and reducing red tape for developers.
It wants to incentivise councils to consent more land for development and build more infrastructure by sharing a portion of GST levied on construction. It would also remove local councils from the building standards process.
