Leaky homes crackdown could cost $30,000 for some houses

By SIMON COLLINS

Builders may be forced to strip stucco cladding off almost-completed houses and rebuild them with air gaps to drain away water after the latest sudden crackdown on leaky houses.

Builders said the changes could add up to $30,000 to the cost of large houses.

The Consumers' Institute has called for compensation for home buyers hit by the new rules.

But the Building Industry Authority (BIA), which announced the rule change with immediate effect yesterday, said it would affect only "a handful" of the 600 homes (3 per cent of new houses) that were built with stucco walls last year.

"We would say no way 600, probably not even hundreds," said authority spokesman Laurie Edwards.

"The anecdotal evidence from the councils is a handful, and even with those, it's not like they are declined. They only need to be assessed in a different way."

Stucco, a thin layer of plaster over fibre-cement or wire netting, became popular in New Zealand in the 1980s.

But stucco homes made up 36 per cent of the 284 leaky homes evaluated so far by the Government's Weathertight Homes Resolution Service - more than 10 times stucco's share of the new homes built last year.

Mr Edwards said the authority still planned more comprehensive changes to the building code to come into force this year, but brought forward the change for stucco because the figures were so clear.

The move means that stucco-clad houses are no longer an "acceptable solution" under the Building Code unless they have ventilated cavities behind them to drain away any water that gets through the outside wall.

Councils may still approve stucco houses without cavities if they have an "alternative solution" to keep water out, such as wide overhanging eaves and good fittings around windows and doors.

But the president of the Master Builders' Federation, Taupo builder John Marshall, said most smaller councils took their cue on what was acceptable from the Building Industry Authority.

"To make this retrospective is a horrendous cost."

Mr Marshall said he knew of houses in Taupo, some being built by his firm, that had valid building consents issued under the old code for stucco walls without cavities.

But they were now unlikely to be certified as complying with the new code.

"If you have almost finished and you have to redo all the cladding, some houses could cost $30,000. Some might be only $8000.

"If you hadn't started, then the cost is a lot less - it might only be $1000 or $2000."

The change will have less effect in cities such as Auckland, North Shore and Waitakere, which all pre-empted the authority by requiring cavities for all plaster-clad new homes from last December.

But Manukau Mayor Sir Barry Curtis said then that acting retrospectively against certifying houses whose plans had been granted building permits was "against the principles of natural justice".

Manukau building consents manager Jason Reu said last night that new permits in the city required cavities from last December 12, but he would still allow homes started before that date without cavities.

"If people have building consents using solid plaster [stucco] and have put it in without a cavity, we'll be honouring those building consents," he said.

"If they are still prior to putting the solid plaster on, we'll be advising them to look at the BIA statement and act accordingly."

Consumers' Institute chief executive David Russell said people caught by the change of rules should be compensated.

"We believe there should be some relief for those people who, through no fault of their own, rely on the builder and the architect and the national building code," he said.

"They are now being subjected to what could be tens of thousands of extra dollars to put a cavity in, to have a 'double skin'."

But Mr Edwards said there were no plans to compensate anyone.

"There are always going to be people caught in the transition," he said.

"Often we'll go for a longer lead-in period if the issue is not that serious or if there are strong reasons to delay it.

"For example, with timber treatment we had three and a half months (a) so people could finish their buildings, and (b) so the industry had time to adapt.

"With this one, we didn't want any new consents approved for it.

"The discussions we've had with the territorial authorities, mainly in Auckland, suggest that virtually nobody has been building to this 'acceptable solution' anyway."