Tarred with the leaky building brush

Gary Queree's North Shore home is built in the Mediterranean style common to leaky buildings, but has been certified water-tight. He has had it on the market for eight months. Photo / Paul Estcourt

Gary Queree's North Shore home has languished on the property market for eight months, because it is in the style associated with leaky homes.

"It's a beautiful home in a beautiful spot," says Bayleys real estate agent Prue de Bie. "But once people see the cladding, they won't come and see it. They won't even make inquiries."

And Mr Queree is now concerned the council will penalise him by lowering its value, simply because his house looks like it shares the design and appearance of a leaky structure.

He said the two-storey Browns Bay home was "dry as a bone after mountains of rain", a fact backed by thermagraphic analysis and building reports. "My house is drier than the so-called recommended houses - as dry as any house in Auckland could hope to be."

"It is one of three different units built by three different builders at three different times. But they all look the same - Mediterranean-style. And that carries a huge stigma."

He said the stigma which infected the sale of leaky-looking houses needed to end, yet the council was reaffirming it. "I think generalising any situation like this is incredibly irresponsible and dangerous. Why do they want to denigrate the value of people's investments?

"There has to be a counter-argument to the original outburst - which destroyed the value of a lot of houses - but the council is going in the other direction.

"If they're going to degrade the value of a house, they need to go to that house, look at that house, and see if it is a leaky home or if it is as good as the day it was built.

He said that most offers on his home had come from newly arrived immigrants, who had no knowledge of the leaky building saga.

"We had two couples who were ready to pay the price we wanted. But one had a son who said 'Leaky roof! Leaky roof!' despite the reports showing otherwise.

"People are gullible - they walk into a house and say, 'Oh it looks like this could be a leaky roof', and they walk away. There needs to be an end to this knee-jerk reaction."