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Andrew Eagles: NZ Green Building Council CEO on the Healthy Homes requirements kicking in tomorrow · Best of Business

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks'd be follow
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  Speaker 2: Now tomorrow, you're a landline? Got this one in your diary?
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  Speaker 2: Haven't you a landlord? Rather? Landlord? Tomorrow's the deadline to
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  Speaker 2: have your rental up to healthy home standards. Landlords have
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  Speaker 2: had six years to comply, yet figures from Better Group
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  Speaker 2: show only twenty three percent past every regulation. Now Andrew
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  Speaker 2: Eagles is the CEO of the New Zealand Green Building Council,
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  Speaker 2: is with us. Now, Hey, Andrew.
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  Speaker 3: Tuo, great to speak, good to talk to you.
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  Speaker 2: Do you believe those numbers?
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  Speaker 3: Well? I think, I mean, there are people that are
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  Speaker 3: failing as standards. Different groups have different numbers, but I
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  Speaker 3: think it's right to say that not every home is past.
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  Speaker 2: What do you reckon? What is the number of homes
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  Speaker 2: across the country that would fail?
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  Speaker 3: Oh, that's really tough questions. Look, I would say I
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  Speaker 3: would say I'd like to think it's less than thirty percent.
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  Speaker 3: To be honest, there's been six years with the awful
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  Speaker 3: lot of assessments and work, and I know that many
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  Speaker 3: are pushing to get it done in the final months,
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  Speaker 3: which is a real shame because lots of people are
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  Speaker 3: booked up, right, you know, you call an assessor with
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  Speaker 3: someone to make the improvements, that's even harder thing. And
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  Speaker 3: I've speaken to an insulation provider and he said, well,
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  Speaker 3: he's been booked up for three months. So they're just
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  Speaker 3: they can't get that done. They should have been thinking
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  Speaker 3: of this two three years ago.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, but even at thirty percent, that's one in three
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  Speaker 2: houses that would fail, isn't it.
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  Speaker 3: That's right, yep. And some will be more significant than others.
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  Speaker 3: So that's a real That means a family that's got drafts,
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  Speaker 3: or isn't it healthier or warm as there could be,
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  Speaker 3: And that's real shame for that family.
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  Speaker 2: Have you heard that there are landlords who are flat
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  Speaker 2: out telling property management companies that they are not going
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  Speaker 2: to comply, they're refusing.
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  Speaker 3: I haven't heard that. I mean, there may be some
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  Speaker 3: who are like that, but I think, look, there's lots
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  Speaker 3: of great landlords out there who want healthy tenants because
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  Speaker 3: they're going to be more likely to pay and more
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  Speaker 3: likely to stay. But I can't imagine there's some bad
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  Speaker 3: apples who just can't. I think there's some who never
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  Speaker 3: got round to it a little bit of laziness or
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  Speaker 3: lack of planning, and then I can see that some
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  Speaker 3: might might be quite denigrating of their actual duties. You know,
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  Speaker 3: I could see that might happen.
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  Speaker 2: Have you seen the punishment? I was reading the Herald
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  Speaker 2: Set and there was an article suggesting that the punishment
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  Speaker 2: that would like the worst case for a landlord who
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  Speaker 2: didn't actually manage to get around to doing all of this,
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  Speaker 2: would be about seven two hundred dollars. And that would
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  Speaker 2: be if there are recidivus. The first punishment is more
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  Speaker 2: likely to be twenty four hundred.
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  Speaker 3: You aware of that, Yes, yeah, I'm aware of that.
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  Speaker 3: That's the standard fines, I mean pretty well, yeah, that's right.
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  Speaker 3: I mean there have been fines of significantly more than
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  Speaker 3: that for really bad incidences where the place is in
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  Speaker 3: a really bad state. Yeah, I think that the money
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  Speaker 3: going to those tenants is good. You know, that's the person.
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  Speaker 2: But the point I'm trying to get to, Andrew is,
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  Speaker 2: if you are a landlord and you need to insulate
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  Speaker 2: top and bottom, you need to draft stop, you need
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  Speaker 2: to put a heat pumpin, you need to put a
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  Speaker 2: fan in both bathrooms, you need to put a fan
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  Speaker 2: in the kitchen. Like your costs are adding upright, we
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  Speaker 2: are now in the tens of that, like significantly tens
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  Speaker 2: of thousands of dollars. Would you not be rational to
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  Speaker 2: just take your chances and pay a two thousand dollars? Fine?
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  Speaker 3: But most most aren't doing that. I can see the
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  Speaker 3: logic of where you're going. I think for many there
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  Speaker 3: will be a couple of items where they're failing at
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  Speaker 3: and in that instance it's better to get the work done,
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  Speaker 3: have a happier tenant. He's more likely to pay.
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  Speaker 2: But be way poorer. The point I'm trying to do
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  Speaker 2: to the point I'm.
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  Speaker 3: Trying to do to is you'll we find again here
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  Speaker 3: the right.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, oh yeah, and then over time it'll become seven
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  Speaker 2: thousand or five hundred the yeah. But you could also,
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  Speaker 2: given the sheer numbers, you could also just take it,
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  Speaker 2: take a chance getting lost in the numbers, right, because
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  Speaker 2: there's no way there's enough compliance officers to deal with
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  Speaker 2: all of this. So tomorrow, when we get there, is
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  Speaker 2: there not a chance that the story tomorrow, which is
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  Speaker 2: like let's say your numbers, thirty percent of houses aren't complying,
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  Speaker 2: is actually the same story in about five or ten years.
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  Speaker 2: Thirty percent of houses aren't complying because a lot of
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  Speaker 2: them just simply won't.
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  Speaker 3: I do think we need more compliance, We need more
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  Speaker 3: compliance managers, and we need more headlined stories of people
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  Speaker 3: being fined. I have seen fines up to over twenty
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  Speaker 3: thousand dollars for really bad states. I think, look, it
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  Speaker 3: would and we need respect finding right if you get fined,
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  Speaker 3: I mean my suggestion would be you checked again. Within
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  Speaker 3: three to six months, you're going to find again. You've
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  Speaker 3: got time to get that right. Look, it's better for
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  Speaker 3: your tenants. They're more likely to pay rent and they're
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  Speaker 3: in a healthier, warm place. They're more likely to stay
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  Speaker 3: yea healthy what's your biggest cost, it's not having a
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  Speaker 3: tenant for three to six months. You don't want to
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  Speaker 3: lack that rental income. If there's a lot that's seventy
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  Speaker 3: percent of homes out there do have the standard. People
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  Speaker 3: are getting more and more savvy about what they need
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  Speaker 3: to do to go to tenancy tribunal. There's more cases
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  Speaker 3: at the Tennessee tribunal. So your choice is do I
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  Speaker 3: put a fan in like book? As an electrician, pay
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  Speaker 3: a few hundred dollars get the fan in or do
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  Speaker 3: I face discreetly tribunal and then not have a tenant
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  Speaker 3: for three or four months and have another check come
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  Speaker 3: and check up on me in three months. I know
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  Speaker 3: which I do.
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  Speaker 2: Andrew, thanks very much, appreciate your time as Andrew Eagle,
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  Speaker 2: CEO of New Zealand Green Building Council.
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