- Hon Dr Megan Woods
250 new warm, dry homes officially opened in Auckland today including:
• 90 public housing homes
• 34 KiwiBuild homes
• 43 market homes and
• 83 transitional housing homes
The Government's commitment to ensuring more New Zealanders have warm, dry, healthy homes is paying off in Auckland, where the Housing Minister Megan Woods today opened a 167 unit apartment in Glen Eden and 83 transitional homes in Ōtahuhu.
"This is a critical time for New Zealand as we work toward everyone having a warm, safe and healthy place to call home. The best way to address the growing demand is to bring on more quality housing at pace, as we continue to recover from the impacts of COVID-19. That's exactly what we are doing," says Minister of Housing Megan Woods.
In Glen Eden, three different types of housing have been delivered in the 167 Westlight apartment complex. That's made up of 90 public housing (two and four bedroom) units, 34 (one bedroom and two bedroom) KiwiBuild homes and 43 private apartments. It is also close to schools, public transport, the town centre, and a busy main street.
"The Westlight Apartments are a fantastic example of what can be achieved by taking a multi-pronged approach to addressing our housing shortage. This new build will support singles, couples and small family units to live, work and thrive in the Glen Eden community."
"The first tenants who moved are already benefiting from the high quality of the build. The Westlight development has an impressive Homestar 6 accreditation. As a result, residents will use significantly less energy and water, and will have less condensation, making it healthier to live in and more affordable." Minister Woods said.
The Ted Mason Foundation provided the capital to build the Westlight Apartments and partnered with Community Housing Provider, Compass Housing. The contract is a 25 year lease by Tūāpapa Kura Kāinga - the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, leased directly from Ted Mason, with a right of renewal after 25 years.
Meanwhile 83 (one bedroom and two bedroom) new builds, split across two buildings on Atkinson Avenue in Ōtahuhu are show casing the Government's continued commitment to building more transitional homes under the Aotearoa New Zealand Homelessness Action Plan (HAP).
"Atkinson Avenue is one of four developments recently completed in Auckland by Kāinga Ora which has delivered 129 extra transitional housing homes in total in the past two months, with the other sites delivering 29 more homes in Mangere and 17 homes in Blockhouse Bay.
"In addition to the delivery of these much needed homes, these new builds are supporting the economy with more jobs and apprenticeships.
"We are building more public houses than there has been in a generation- 6,958 new public houses and 5414 new builds since November 2017. We're on track to deliver over 18,000 public and transitional housing places by 2024. The $3.8 billion Housing Acceleration Fund, announced last month, will help stimulate more housing construction by funding necessary infra-structure for new land development.
"We are using all available levers and supporting partnerships between the Ministry, Kāinga Ora, iwi and Māori, community housing providers, local government, developers and the construction industry to get build more homes," Minister Woods said.
