Property report: Housing crisis continues

As a city, not only do we have a long way to go to give everyone a clean, dry and warm home, there is ample opportunity for businesses to give people what they need. Photo / Doug Sherring

Since the turn of the century, various reports have illustrated how the number of new homes being built in Auckland has not kept up with demand, which has in turn pushed prices up.

Year after year we read headlines about the city's housing crisis, and anyone who doubted the crisis actually existed had to concede the reality of the situation after the 2008 GFC. The global financial meltdown shook the banks to their core, and they were forced to pull in their horns big time.

Suddenly, property developers could not get the money they needed to build houses in places such as Auckland. Banks wanted safe harbours for their loans, and "risky" business ventures - such as building homes for people - didn't get much of a look in.

Still, people continued to move to New Zealand to start a new life and contributed to making Auckland's real estate some of the most expensive on the planet.

Look at the houses that were built pre-GFC, too many of them were too expensive for new home buyers or the average family.

But what else were developers to put on expensive land? A lack of land supply for developers played a part in this ongoing disaster. Land banking also cannot be ignored.

In December 2007 just under 2000 building consents were issued in New Zealand. That figure dropped like a stone as the GFC took hold, and a year later the figure was just over 1000.

In January, 1703 building consents were issued. We are only now returning to numbers close to 2007, but we are some way from the 2004 property boom and already there are worrying signs this upturn is petering out. Statistics New Zealand says the seasonally adjusted number of new dwellings consented decreased 3.8 per cent in January, following a 2.3 per cent decrease in December 2014.

But remember, even during the boom years, property developers were not keeping up with demand.

Plenty of organisations have raised their concerns about the housing crisis, but still too little appears to be being done. In fact, some could argue the selling off of State housing will not help - especially in the short term.

The Salvation Army, in a report released on February 11, says Auckland's housing deficit grew by a further 4000 dwellings during the year to 30 September 2014. "A record shortfall," it says.

According to Statistics New Zealand, Auckland's population grew by 33,700 people in 2014, but only 7366 building consents were issued. While Auckland's population grew by 49 per cent, housing consents in the city grew by just 26 per cent.

As a city, not only do we have a long way to go to give everyone a clean, dry and warm home, there is ample opportunity for businesses to give people what they need.