Purchasing social housing tenancies

The Ministry of Social Development (MSD) has today released information on its social housing purchasing intentions.

MSD purchases tenancies from Housing New Zealand and registered community housing providers for people on the social housing register.

Deputy CE Social Policy Nic Blakeley says the information is intended for providers of social housing, including those looking at coming into the market.

"The information released today gives a picture of current demand for social housing. It provides an indication of where extra places are likely to be needed over the next two to three years, the number of tenancies MSD expects to fund by location and how MSD will contract with social housing providers for tenancies," says Mr Blakeley.

"MSD expects to purchase an additional 3,000 social housing tenancies by 2017/18, taking total tenancies to 65,000.

Of these 3,000 additional tenancies MSD expects that an additional 1,810 places will be purchased in Auckland, 730 of which are likely to be one bedroom properties.

Canterbury is expected to require an additional 480 places, most of which will be one or two bedroom properties.

Nationally demand is highest for one bedroom social housing properties with an estimated 1,380 of these required.

Tenants’ eligibility for social housing will not be affected. Rather this information will help ensure the right houses are in the right locations and are better matched to tenants’ needs," says Mr Blakeley.

In Auckland 300 additional IRRS funded tenancies will be sought with the release of a Request for Proposal (RFP) in early May.

MSD is looking for innovative proposals from registered Community Housing Providers, or organisations that can achieve registration.

This is the first IRRS purchasing intentions information release.

"This information is expected to help inform decisions about the types of social housing provided around the country.

The release is about more than our purchasing intentions. It provides information about how MSD works with providers, agrees market rents, contracts and funds social housing, and conducts needs assessments.

We want to make sure the information is fit for purpose and useful to housing providers, so we will be asking housing providers to provide their feedback via a survey in July. Their input through that survey will guide the content of the next release of information," says Mr Blakeley.

If providers want to participate in the survey they should register their interest in being involved by emailing social_housing@msd.govt.nz (subject line: Purchasing intentions).