A Tale of Three Articles. Truth, half-truth, or nothing like the truth?

[Perry]

The expensive mistakes made by NZ's amateur landlords
26 April 2017

Learning landlording skills is tough in a fragmented "industry" dominated by part-timers.

There are in the region of 130,000 landlords in New Zealand, the majority of who have only one rental. Figures obtained in 2015 from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment showed just over 104,000 landlords had just one rental, and just under 23,000 had between two and five.

What about people who are not captured by the Ministry of Bungling & Inappropriate Expenditure's stats?

Editorial: If rental property standards don't improve now, they never will
26 April 2017

OPINION: A study out this week confirmed what every skint student and current or former tenant of a dodgy flat already knew: rentals can be a cold, damp nightmare.

The anecdotal truth was now an empirical one. A survey by the Building Research Association of New Zealand (Branz) found that rentals were twice as likely to have poorly maintained features as owner-occupied homes. They were also twice as likely to smell musty, three times more likely to feel damp, and more likely to have visible mould.

What a raft of hung comparatives.

Rental properties in far worse condition than owner-occupied homes, survey finds
25 April 2017
Branz building performance research team leader Mark Jones said, "the aim is to try and improve our housing stock and get them warmer, drier and healthier. We are hoping some of the areas we highlight and the data we are finding with our House Condition Survey supports the movement in that direction."

---

Where does one start with such drivelism*?

Insulation does not make a house warmer. Heaters do.
Surveys do not make a house drier. Dehumidifiers do.
A rentals WOF will not make a house healthier. It will increase the rent.

* Formerly called journalism.

[Courham]

Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Labour Spokesman for Housing and some health professional were interviewed by Alison Mau this evening about 20% of private rentals being cold or mouldy based on that BRANZ research. Their research excluded HNZ whose figures that they couldn't supply but would be interesting. Focus was on cold damp rentals and the need to upgrade insulation and install modern woodfires or heat pumps. No mention of unaffordable electricity contributing too poor heating in rentals.

I've put 2 new heat pumps in recently, replacing old inefficient log burners (new regs on their use kicking on down here next year) so have done my bit. Pity the tenants could get access to cheap/free firewood. No guarantee they'll be able to afford to run the heat pumps.

Craig

[Wellington Broker]

Have read the BRANZ survey. Seems the overall standard of properties is higher based on the assessments and the gap is the same as the 2010 survey but the perception of quality from tenants has dropped - likely due to politicians and media constantly telling everyone that rental properties are terrible and higher expectations from tenants.

[Wayne]

In the 1st article about the amateur landlords - it seemed to imply that all the people who owned only 1 rental would be managing it themselves.
I have no idea if this is true or not though I suspect not.
So if they have a PM then they may be amateur owners with a professional land lord.

[Perry]

Time to Add a Fourth

Your Rental Property Horror Stories
27 April 2017

We want to hear your worst rental property horror stories. Are your lips and fingers going blue? Do you wear puffer jackets to bed? Are your landlords or flatmates unreasonable? We want to hear it. Let us know how bad it was, and send us pictures to prove it. Hit the button below to make our blood run cold with your rental property horror stories. As always, we are looking for contributions of 250 words or more.

It seems that LLs need not apply.

More even-handed drivelism from Stuff et al?

Any LLs on the forum want to "hit the button" and contribute their tale of woe? All in the interests of helping Stuff achieve fairness and balance, you understand.

[Anthonyacat]

In the 1st article about the amateur landlords - it seemed to imply that all the people who owned only 1 rental would be managing it themselves.
I have no idea if this is true or not though I suspect not.
So if they have a PM then they may be amateur owners with a professional land lord.

Don't know the truth in it, but I was looking at an ad for a property management company recently that said an amazingly low percentage of NZ rentals are professionally managed.

EDIT: Here it is, my bolding.

The NZ property management industry is experiencing significant growth and will continue to do so as we follow the Australian market. Around 25% of NZ rentals are managed by property managers compared to 80% in Australia. This alone presents a major opportunity for those involved in property management in NZ.

[Perry]

Is The Playing Field Level?

Around 25% of NZ rentals are managed by property managers compared to 80% in Australia.

Is there any legislation that predisposes that variation?

What's the RTA equivalent in Oz? Or an equivalent for the Ministry of Bungling and Inappropriate Expenditure?

If the Aussies have some sort of TT Kangaroo Kourt like NZ, are there figures available?

It would be interesting to compare the data. Might be able to draw a comparison from it, that professional PM-managed are no better / equivalent / better than, self-managed.

[sidinz]

I've put 2 new heat pumps in recently, replacing old inefficient log burners (new regs on their use kicking on down here next year) so have done my bit. Pity the tenants could get access to cheap/free firewood. No guarantee they'll be able to afford to run the heat pumps.

Craig

Yep, I met some ropable HNZ tenants in Ashburton a few years ago. Apparently it was policy at the time to replace the old open fires - a new woodburner for 3 bedrooms or more and a heat pump for 1-2 beddies. These solo mums in 2-bedroomed houses had previously got free/cheap firewood, living in an agricultural area, and were now facing huge heating bills. Where do they find the idiots who make these policy decisions? SMH

[SPerfect]

I own 4 rental properties - no one's ever checked them to see if they're cold or mouldy - so based on that I'd say this stat is absolute rubbish. Maybe HNZ houses are damp/mouldy cause they certainly don't keep up the maintenance on their properties but I'd wager most landlords treat their properties as investments and take care of them.

Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Labour Spokesman for Housing and some health professional were interviewed by Alison Mau this evening about 20% of private rentals being cold or mouldy based on that BRANZ research. Their research excluded HNZ whose figures that they couldn't supply but would be interesting. Focus was on cold damp rentals and the need to upgrade insulation and install modern woodfires or heat pumps. No mention of unaffordable electricity contributing too poor heating in rentals.

I've put 2 new heat pumps in recently, replacing old inefficient log burners (new regs on their use kicking on down here next year) so have done my bit. Pity the tenants could get access to cheap/free firewood. No guarantee they'll be able to afford to run the heat pumps.

Craig

[Wayne]

I own 4 rental properties - no one's ever checked them to see if they're cold or mouldy - so based on that I'd say this stat is absolute rubbish. Maybe HNZ houses are damp/mouldy cause they certainly don't keep up the maintenance on their properties but I'd wager most landlords treat their properties as investments and take care of them.

They do a sample as usual.
No idea how they chose the sample - random you'd hope.

[sidinz]

Maybe HNZ houses are damp/mouldy

They are. But I can say with absolute eye-witness certainty that in 99% of the cases, it is tenant-caused.

[Perry]

But, but, it can't be! What are you saying?
The media says it's always the fault of the evil LL.
Never the fault of all those angelic tenants.
The media couldn't possibly have it wrong, could they?

[Davo36]

They are. But I can say with absolute eye-witness certainty that in 99% of the cases, it is tenant-caused.

You horrible tenant bashing person you!

At least they're hard-working and honest, not like you lazy landlord, just sitting around getting richer by the day doing nothing!

[flyernzl]

My own interpretation (from what I hear through the CAB) is that many tenants put up with discomfort in their rentals rather than complain.
When you point out that they could issue a 14 day notice to the Landlord to rectify, these tenants reply "Oh I don't want to do that. If I complain he'll put the rent up".

What they are really saying is that they would prefer to pay cheap and get cheap rather than pay a market price for a good rental.

All those Dunedin students who rent hovels could actually go out and rent good clean spacious accommodation. They don't do that because it would cost them $800 per week.
They prefer to rent scungy at $200 a week and complain that it is not as good as the $800 a week stuff.

[flyernzl]

In terms of the survey, I wonder if those doing the survey were aware that the house they were inspecting was a rental before carrying out the survey.

If they were, they could be biased against filing a good report because of their own misconceptions that a rental would always be in a poor condition.

Ideally, to remove bias, they should not know.