“After the median house price rose $200,000 and with no reason to believe the rise will stop, the Government has resorted to asking people not to invest in housing,” says ACT Housing Spokesperson Brooke van Velden.
“This morning, the Prime Minister said, ‘the number of investors going in is part of the issue. What we want them to think about doing is how can you contribute to the productive economy in New Zealand?’ Having to beg people not to invest in housing is an admission of failure.
“This Government was elected to make housing affordable, but after 3 ½ years the median house price has risen 38 percent from $530,000 to $730,000. The Prime Minister has to beg people not to invest because the Government has no other plan.
“Astonishingly the Prime Minister told Newshub Nation this morning ‘I'm not going to get into hypotheticals about what we will or won't do until we've actually made some considered decisions… Ultimately, we haven't made any decisions on anything… We've said, look, we've asked for advice. Let's wait for that to come to us and make those calls.’
“The Prime Minister’s statement comes at the end of a week where three separate reports from Demographia, Core Logic, and the New Zealand Initiative showed New Zealand housing is unaffordable by international standards, rising rapidly, and caused by a lack of supply, respectively.
“ACT has long said that Government policy needs to free up land, fund infrastructure more effectively, and get councils out of building quality assurance. Current policy settings have failed at all three of these. ACT’s plan to allow the next generation to Build like the Boomers could fix all three.
“If we are serious about ending child poverty, giving the next generation a shot at owning their own part of New Zealand, and rebalancing the economy, then it won’t do to ask people not to invest in a rising market. The Government must fix the supply side first.”