As you may have seen, Christchurch is the only New Zealand city where it is cheaper to buy a house than rent, meaning more people are looking to ownership.
The forecast is 3500 people moving to Christchurch each year and more places need to be built to fill the current vacuum. A good proportion of them will want to live on our coastal paradise (wise choice).
One of the biggest impediments the New Brighton Residents Association hears from potential house developers, has been how to make housing more affordable in central New Brighton. This means the prices have to be reasonably sharp.
The equation is for New Brighton:
affordable houses = people who bring spending power = New Brighton Mall investment
This Friday, the City Councillors will be reviewing the ‘Development Contribution Plan’. It will be streamed live.
Before you start yawning, it is relatively important for a number of reasons, but mainly a potentially significant effect on new housing in central New Brighton.
What does DC stand for aside from legendary All Black ‘Dan Carter’ ?
Any developer building houses or commercial premises places additional demand on the city’s community infrastructure such as the transport network, water supply and parks etc.
Therefore is expected to make a lump sum contribution for the upgrade of such facilities to cope.
The amount of ‘development contributions’ required depends on the location and how many household equivalent units (HUEs) of additional demand but could be anything up to $10,000 to $70,000 (Akaroa) per unit/house.
Since 2014, the DC scheme has rebated 100% of contributions for residential development only within the Four Avenues by those big Christchurch developers, to encourage lower pricing on apartments and intensify residential activity in the central area.
Why this policy should now apply to New Brighton is simple:
1. New Brighton is one of the City Council’s special projects and the rebirth of the commercial hub a lost cause for years until recently. Now it has pumped in a great deal of money with more to come into that area via the LTP, the last piece of the puzzle is getting permanent residents into the central area on the land currently available.
2. The argument for remitting or reducing the Development Contribution, is the fact the housing prices need to be lower in purchase price, than those being subsidised in the centre of CHCH.
NBRA is hoping Councillors support the transfer of the residential rebate to other parts of the City where the need is greatest.
One of the good arguments is… adding to the housing supply within the New Brighton area also boosts Christchurch’s rating base, so the council stands to gain bigger revenue flows from rates and higher capital values, outweighing the debt-servicing costs.
A developed property has significantly higher capital value than an undeveloped lot, and pays more in rates and these benefits outweigh the cost of the scheme within a relatively short period.
Unfortunately with so many submissions being required on so many issues at the same time, the New Brighton Residents Assn missed the deadline for input.
City Councillor Sara Templeton, a great supporter of the east, made sure the New Brighton Residents Assn report (as outlined above) made it to staff who will include it in the analysis of submission points for council, and upload it as part of the documentation for deliberations.
Whether the Council come to the party or not remains to be seen, but the NBRA is making sure it has raised the issue and will be part of the argument to come.
New housing buyers in central New Brighton may be the benefactors (fingers crossed).