Pressure on to line up houses for Cup visitors

City apartments are proving popular, as are central suburbs such as Westmere, Grey Lynn, Ponsonby, St Heliers and Kohimarama. File photo / Dean Purcell

Rugby World Cup fever is gathering pace in Auckland with a surge in demand for accommodation and websites urging homeowners to use their houses as a money-spinner.

A company that manages the rental of homes to Rugby World Cup visitors, 80 Minute Game, has called for at least 100 more Auckland homeowners to put their properties up for rent in the coming weeks.

Director Sue Robinson said demand had leaped as tourists settled their itineraries, and the company was now booking homes at a greater rate than it was listing them.

The company had already rented hundreds of homes, and had helped about 1500 confirmed guests find accommodation - a number expected to double by kick-off in September.

"I think with the ballot announcement for semifinals and finals, people have suddenly realised that the World Cup is this year. We've noticed probably a 150 per cent increase in numbers over the last couple of weeks," Mrs Robinson said.

Other websites, gorugbyhomes.co.nz, stayinnz.com and stay2011.com, all said there was growing demand for Auckland homes.

City apartments were popular, as were central suburbs such as Westmere, Grey Lynn, Ponsonby, St Heliers and Kohimarama, Mrs Robinson said.

"We're finding that Mt Eden's still a bit of a hit-and-miss area. I think that's because the pricing is quite high, and people are choosing to stay in locations one or two suburbs away from Eden Park and pay a slightly lower price."

Houses in West and South Auckland and the North Shore were proving more difficult to rent out.

"The perception is that [the North Shore] is a long way away ... Our main pool tends to be people who want to be close to Party Central."

Most demand was for homes of three or four bedrooms with two or three bathrooms, which were snapped up quickly as long as they were priced reasonably - around $400 to $500 a night.

Homeowners could increase that price if they put in extra beds, Mrs Robinson said.

Stayinnz.com co-director Hamish Congalton said people with spare bedrooms could expect to charge a couple $150 to $185 per night for a double room, if their home was reasonably centrally located. "Obviously the hotels are going for a lot more than that. But we've said to people you can't compare apples with oranges."

Mrs Robinson said groups of neighbouring houses that could be rented as a package were wanted by tour groups.

"In a lot of cases we'll get a home, and then they'll go and chat to their neighbours. And then the neighbours ring up and say you can have our house too, and then someone from a few doors down joins in."

While some homes were advertised for up to $1500 a night on 80minutegame.com, the company also had about 10 even more palatial VIP homes that it did not publicly advertise.

"We've had a lot of inquiries for [VIP homes], but they're very difficult to turn over," said Mrs Robinson. "We haven't booked some of our original ones that we took on right at the beginning."

Demand could increase if Christchurch lost its Cup games.