It informed the housing ministers about COVID-19's impacts on landlords and property managers nearly a month ago
The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) is calling for an extension to the Healthy Homes deadline as landlords might not have processed the requirements during the COVID-19 alert level 4 lockdown.
Beginning July 01, 2020, landlords must include a statement of their current level of compliance with the Healthy Homes Standards in new, varied, or renewed tenancy agreement.
However, REINZ chief executive officer Bindi Norwell pointed out that the alert level 4 lockdown might have prevented landlords and property managers from accessing properties. Therefore, they might miss the deadline due to the backlog of properties.
“Before the country went in lockdown on March 26, landlords and property managers across the country were working hard to meet the July 01 deadline. However, since lockdown, landlords and property managers have been unable to access rental properties to allow qualified tradespeople to complete compliance statements,” Norwell said.
“As inspections are required by either qualified tradespeople or people with ‘sufficient, relevant experience,’ it now means there is a backlog of properties to be assessed. Therefore, compliance statements may be unable to be completed by the deadline, causing delays to a tenancy commencing.”
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Norwell said REINZ informed the housing ministers about the issue nearly a month ago but did not receive a response.
“Once we move into level 2, we assume that more tradespeople will be able to recommence inspections. [However], given the bottleneck that has been created, we are calling for the compliance deadline to be extended for by two months until September 01,” Norwell concluded.
