Rental WOF - Maybe also for owner occupied housing as well.

Forums › Home Workshop DIY › Rental WOF - Maybe also for owner occupied housing as well.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

1721 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1577

ID Verified

#2186779 25-Feb-2019 11:21

Handsomedan:

3. Is there no legislation that addresses idiocy? Many of those that bemoan a damp house, dry clothes indoors, cook with windows closed with no fan going and have hot showers, steaming up the bathroom and don't wipe down the walls/mirrors etc, but allow the steam to simply escape into the house. I include homeowners here, too...not just tenants.

Why do tenants need to be assisted constantly, when those that have gone to the trouble and hardship of buying their own home (I know not everyone is so "lucky") have to fend for themselves?

I'm not a landlord, as I've never had the spare coin to invest in property, but my experiences as a renter in the past were that if you treated your rented property as home, not just someone else's property, you fended for yourself and just got on with it. It worked for me and my wife and all of our friends at the time we were all renting...how come it's all changed so much?

Make something idiot proof, the idiots just get "better".

Basically it seems to come down to a total lack of personal responsibility and consequences. It's the era of entitlement where there is always someone or something else to blame and no personal consequences for actions.

Like you, I too looked after rental properties as if they were my own. Nearly always managed to leave them in better condition than when I started. But then, I was brought up to air my bedroom daily (smelly teenage boy), do the chores, replace things that I broke and do preventative tasks (wiping mirrors etc).

MotorDrive Rallying

wellygary

8810 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 5287

#2186785 25-Feb-2019 11:26

Reading through the blurb, its clear that for detached and semi detached housed that they are going to make it pretty hard for anything other than a heat pump to qualify...

(although wood burners will also get the tick, but many council make these hard to install with permit fees etc)

https://www.hud.govt.nz/residential-housing/healthy-rental-homes/healthy-homes-standards/about-the-healthy-home-standards/#heating-standard

tdgeek

30048 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9455

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2186800 25-Feb-2019 11:38

geoffwnz:

Handsomedan:

3. Is there no legislation that addresses idiocy? Many of those that bemoan a damp house, dry clothes indoors, cook with windows closed with no fan going and have hot showers, steaming up the bathroom and don't wipe down the walls/mirrors etc, but allow the steam to simply escape into the house. I include homeowners here, too...not just tenants.

Why do tenants need to be assisted constantly, when those that have gone to the trouble and hardship of buying their own home (I know not everyone is so "lucky") have to fend for themselves?

I'm not a landlord, as I've never had the spare coin to invest in property, but my experiences as a renter in the past were that if you treated your rented property as home, not just someone else's property, you fended for yourself and just got on with it. It worked for me and my wife and all of our friends at the time we were all renting...how come it's all changed so much?

Make something idiot proof, the idiots just get "better".

Basically it seems to come down to a total lack of personal responsibility and consequences. It's the era of entitlement where there is always someone or something else to blame and no personal consequences for actions.

Like you, I too looked after rental properties as if they were my own. Nearly always managed to leave them in better condition than when I started. But then, I was brought up to air my bedroom daily (smelly teenage boy), do the chores, replace things that I broke and do preventative tasks (wiping mirrors etc).

It seems the conclusion is landlords are all good, houses are all good, tenants are all bad? Obviously that's not the case but the theme here shows that lean.

I dont agree with a number of the new regs, but many of them are basic and wont affect many landlords. If a house passes and the tenants doesn't open the windows, etc, that doesn't fall under the Act. If the house has lights and smoke alarms thats it, it complies. Flat batteries and no bulbs, it still complies

The changes should catch slack landlords and unsatisfactory housing, and both of these apply.

davidcole

6099 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1465

Trusted

#2186810 25-Feb-2019 11:43

tdgeek:

geoffwnz:

Handsomedan:

3. Is there no legislation that addresses idiocy? Many of those that bemoan a damp house, dry clothes indoors, cook with windows closed with no fan going and have hot showers, steaming up the bathroom and don't wipe down the walls/mirrors etc, but allow the steam to simply escape into the house. I include homeowners here, too...not just tenants.

Why do tenants need to be assisted constantly, when those that have gone to the trouble and hardship of buying their own home (I know not everyone is so "lucky") have to fend for themselves?

I'm not a landlord, as I've never had the spare coin to invest in property, but my experiences as a renter in the past were that if you treated your rented property as home, not just someone else's property, you fended for yourself and just got on with it. It worked for me and my wife and all of our friends at the time we were all renting...how come it's all changed so much?

Make something idiot proof, the idiots just get "better".

Basically it seems to come down to a total lack of personal responsibility and consequences. It's the era of entitlement where there is always someone or something else to blame and no personal consequences for actions.

Like you, I too looked after rental properties as if they were my own. Nearly always managed to leave them in better condition than when I started. But then, I was brought up to air my bedroom daily (smelly teenage boy), do the chores, replace things that I broke and do preventative tasks (wiping mirrors etc).

It seems the conclusion is landlords are all good, houses are all good, tenants are all bad? Obviously that's not the case but the theme here shows that lean.

I dont agree with a number of the new regs, but many of them are basic and wont affect many landlords. If a house passes and the tenants doesn't open the windows, etc, that doesn't fall under the Act. If the house has lights and smoke alarms thats it, it complies. Flat batteries and no bulbs, it still complies

The changes should catch slack landlords and unsatisfactory housing, and both of these apply.

TBH, I notice most of the media coverage shows Landlords as the evil. No care, always increasing rents, taking advantage of those less fortunate, and if there are any issues, then they're rich, they can afford to fix any issues caused by the tenants, from damage to any other problems. Any landlords don't seem to make any coverage.

Previously known as psycik

Home Assistant: Gigabyte AMD A8 Brix, Home Assistant with Aeotech ZWave Controller, Raspberry PI, Wemos D1 Mini, Zwave, Shelly Humidity and Temperature sensors
Media:Chromecast v2, ATV4 4k, ATV4, HDHomeRun Dual
Server Host Plex Server 3x3TB, 4x4TB using MergerFS, Samsung 850 evo 512 GB SSD, Proxmox Server with 1xW10, 2xUbuntu 22.04 LTS, Backblaze Backups, usenetprime.com fastmail.com Sharesies Trakt.TV Sharesight

geoffwnz

1721 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1577

ID Verified

#2186813 25-Feb-2019 11:45

tdgeek:

It seems the conclusion is landlords are all good, houses are all good, tenants are all bad? Obviously that's not the case but the theme here shows that lean.

I dont agree with a number of the new regs, but many of them are basic and wont affect many landlords. If a house passes and the tenants doesn't open the windows, etc, that doesn't fall under the Act. If the house has lights and smoke alarms thats it, it complies. Flat batteries and no bulbs, it still complies

The changes should catch slack landlords and unsatisfactory housing, and both of these apply.

I probably could have worded my post better. I definitely agree improvements need to be made in housing in NZ overall. My only observation was that you can't legislate against the determinedly stupid for all the reasons listed in many of the posts above.

MotorDrive Rallying

tdgeek

30048 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9455

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2186816 25-Feb-2019 11:55

davidcole:

TBH, I notice most of the media coverage shows Landlords as the evil. No care, always increasing rents, taking advantage of those less fortunate, and if there are any issues, then they're rich, they can afford to fix any issues caused by the tenants, from damage to any other problems. Any landlords don't seem to make any coverage.

I see that too. It's better news. Bad tenants are dealt with by existing laws (and poorly) and same for bad landlords.This proposed new law at least tidies up some landlords and their bad houses, while most of them and most tenants are not affected. "are not affected" depends if these proposals stay as unworkable and poorly thought out as they are.

tdgeek

30048 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9455

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2186818 25-Feb-2019 11:59

geoffwnz:

tdgeek:

It seems the conclusion is landlords are all good, houses are all good, tenants are all bad? Obviously that's not the case but the theme here shows that lean.

I dont agree with a number of the new regs, but many of them are basic and wont affect many landlords. If a house passes and the tenants doesn't open the windows, etc, that doesn't fall under the Act. If the house has lights and smoke alarms thats it, it complies. Flat batteries and no bulbs, it still complies

The changes should catch slack landlords and unsatisfactory housing, and both of these apply.

I probably could have worded my post better. I definitely agree improvements need to be made in housing in NZ overall. My only observation was that you can't legislate against the determinedly stupid for all the reasons listed in many of the posts above.

I agree. If my rental if I still had one had working lights when it was tenanted. I'm sorted until they leave. Its not my fault if the tenants are slack. If same happened with tenant caused moisture, there would be words, same with alarm battery, although in my case I preferred to change them every daylight savings myself, for the reasons you state

gchiu

1211 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 259

Trusted

#2186846 25-Feb-2019 12:46

Underfloor insulation helps by 1 deg C or less I would guess.

Handsomedan

7769 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7402

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2186903 25-Feb-2019 13:21

gchiu: Underfloor insulation helps by 1 deg C or less I would guess.

I don't know about that - we noticed a remarkable difference when we had ours installed - took away a lot of the "damp" feeling in the carpet and also made the floor feel (perhaps a placebo effect?) much warmer underfoot in the winter.

THat said, we live in Auckland and our climate is temperate to sub-subtropical, so not exactly freezing over in the winters like my family down south.

Handsome Dan Has Spoken.
Handsome Dan needs to stop adding three dots to every sentence...

Handsome Dan does not currently have a side hustle as the mascot for Yale

*Gladly accepting donations...

SATTV

1670 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 657

ID Verified

#2186923 25-Feb-2019 13:56

Handsomedan:

gchiu: Underfloor insulation helps by 1 deg C or less I would guess.

I don't know about that - we noticed a remarkable difference when we had ours installed - took away a lot of the "damp" feeling in the carpet and also made the floor feel (perhaps a placebo effect?) much warmer underfoot in the winter.

THat said, we live in Auckland and our climate is temperate to sub-subtropical, so not exactly freezing over in the winters like my family down south.

We noticed no temperature difference what so ever when we had Expol put under our floor. What we did notice was that if there was a gust of wind the rug ould not lift and dust would no longer come out of the cracks in the floor boards.

Upping the insulation in the ceiling made no difference that we could tell either.

What has mad a difference is double glazing the windows, makes a difference in winter, house stays warmer a lot longer.

John

I know enough to be dangerous

vexxxboy

4336 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2072

#2186928 25-Feb-2019 14:07

i wonder if there are enough trades people to do all the work that is required in the short space of time

Common sense is not as common as you think.

gchiu

1211 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 259

Trusted

#2186941 25-Feb-2019 14:35

Handsomedan:

gchiu: Underfloor insulation helps by 1 deg C or less I would guess.

I don't know about that - we noticed a remarkable difference when we had ours installed - took away a lot of the "damp" feeling in the carpet and also made the floor feel (perhaps a placebo effect?) much warmer underfoot in the winter.

THat said, we live in Auckland and our climate is temperate to sub-subtropical, so not exactly freezing over in the winters like my family down south.

Well, I don't know if my reasoning is valid, but if the outside temperature is 10 C, and you raise it 18 C, and then stop the heater, you'll drop back to 10 C again. Since the heat loss attributed to underfloor flows is thought to be 10-11%, then less than 1 C is lost through the floor. But your insulation won't be 100% effective. So, it's going to stop a loss of less than 1 C.

Underfloor insulation when carpet is present would seem even less cost effective.

Maybe double glazing would be the most effective but that would need a subsidy from the Govt.

mattwnz

20515 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 4794

#2186985 25-Feb-2019 16:08

gchiu:

Rikkitic:

If we suddenly had to use electric heating in any form, we couldn't afford to live here, never mind that we are at the end of a long series of power poles extending out from town and boy racers and trees knocking them out are not unheard of. I am all in favour of regulations that protect vulnerable tenants from exploitation but one-size-fits-all bureaucratic standards with no flexibility are unlikely to fix anything.

Wood burners are one of the approved heating sources.

From what I understand in some areas, if a woodburner is older than a certain age, if the proeprty owner is selling, they have to either get it replaced with a new cleaner buring one, or remove it. I suspect a lot of rentals that have woodburners, will be older ones. So I suspect a lot of those will get removed if they are forced to upgrade them when selling, which then results in colder homes. I do wonder about some of these local laws. Especially as it is often the poorer areas that have problems with air quality. Perhaps a subsidy for upgrading to cleaner woodburners is needed, like they did with insulation

tdgeek

30048 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9455

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2186992 25-Feb-2019 16:26

mattwnz:
gchiu:

Rikkitic:

If we suddenly had to use electric heating in any form, we couldn't afford to live here, never mind that we are at the end of a long series of power poles extending out from town and boy racers and trees knocking them out are not unheard of. I am all in favour of regulations that protect vulnerable tenants from exploitation but one-size-fits-all bureaucratic standards with no flexibility are unlikely to fix anything.

Wood burners are one of the approved heating sources.

From what I understand in some areas, if a woodburner is older than a certain age, if the proeprty owner is selling, they have to either get it replaced with a new cleaner buring one, or remove it. I suspect a lot of rentals that have woodburners, will be older ones. So I suspect a lot of those will get removed if they are forced to upgrade them when selling, which then results in colder homes. I do wonder about some of these local laws. Especially as it is often the poorer areas that have problems with air quality. Perhaps a subsidy for upgrading to cleaner woodburners is needed, like they did with insulation

EECA did that in ChCh years ago. Approved woodburner ceiling batts if you didn’t have any and one annual payment on rates once a year for 10 years. Maybe it’s time again and include heat pump option

vexxxboy

4336 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2072

#2187006 25-Feb-2019 17:04

mattwnz:

gchiu:

Rikkitic:

If we suddenly had to use electric heating in any form, we couldn't afford to live here, never mind that we are at the end of a long series of power poles extending out from town and boy racers and trees knocking them out are not unheard of. I am all in favour of regulations that protect vulnerable tenants from exploitation but one-size-fits-all bureaucratic standards with no flexibility are unlikely to fix anything.

Wood burners are one of the approved heating sources.

From what I understand in some areas, if a woodburner is older than a certain age, if the proeprty owner is selling, they have to either get it replaced with a new cleaner buring one, or remove it. I suspect a lot of rentals that have woodburners, will be older ones. So I suspect a lot of those will get removed if they are forced to upgrade them when selling, which then results in colder homes. I do wonder about some of these local laws. Especially as it is often the poorer areas that have problems with air quality. Perhaps a subsidy for upgrading to cleaner woodburners is needed, like they did with insulation

Rotorua must have the strictest by-laws in the country .You are not allowed to sell your house if you have an old woodburner installed over 10 years old , you must remove it before selling your house and you are not allowed to install any new woodburners in a new build, you must find one that has been removed and under 10 years old to install it. Since these are so rare they go for big money.

Common sense is not as common as you think.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7