Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon
Kāinga Ora has been ordered to pay a tenant $6000 after she was "terrorised" by her neighbours and fellow social housing tenants, who pooed outside her door and allegedly threw a woman off a balcony.
It comes after the government instructed Kāinga Ora to act more harshly towards antisocial tenants, by removing a framework designed to prevent evictions.
According to a recently released Tenancy Tribunal decision, Kāinga Ora failed to address regular complaints from a tenant living in one of its 20-unit housing complexes in Auckland.
The names of those involved cannot be reported due to suppression orders made by tribunal adjudicator Rex Woodhouse.
The tenant said they had been "terrorised" by their neighbours, who had made death threats, left blood, urine and phlegm around the complex, pooed outside her door, slashed car tyres, had fights in the hallways, used methamphetamine, intimidated other tenants and invited antisocial visitors onto the premises who knocked on residents' doors asking for money.
The complainant had to pause her studies as she couldn't cope with her neighbours' behaviour.
"I consider the tenants have been terrified by their neighbours, to the extent she was fearful of leaving her house," Woodhouse said in his ruling.
One of the unruly tenants is also alleged to have seriously injured his partner by throwing her off his second-storey balcony, causing "significant mental trauma and distress" to neighbours who comforted the woman until emergency services arrived.
The tenant was charged with injuring the woman. He has also been charged with minor assault after he allegedly spat on another tenant.
Under the Residential Tenancies Act, landlords may apply to the Tenancy Tribunal to end a tenancy after issuing three notices, if the antisocial behaviour does not stop within a specific time frame.
Landlords can also seek to end a tenancy immediately if their tenant assaults or threatens to assault others living at the property.
Kāinga Ora sent six notices to the tenants requesting a meeting to discuss the bad behaviour - all of which went ignored - before finally applying to the tribunal to have them evicted in March 2024, two weeks after the complaining tenant filed their own complaint to the tribunal.
The application was successful and the tenants were evicted on the grounds that they used the property for unlawful behaviour.
The tribunal decision noted that Kāinga Ora had offered to move the complainant to another home multiple times, instead of applying to the tribunal to have the unruly tenants evicted sooner.
"I am very confident in concluding that any reasonable landlord would have applied to the Tenancy Tribunal well before the landlord did in this case," Woodhouse said in his decision.
Kāinga Ora's inaction had allowed the tenants to continue disturbing others living in the complex, he said, adding that a reasonable landlord would have applied for an immediate termination of the tenancy after something as serious as the alleged balcony-throwing incident.
"I believe the landlord has seriously underestimated and downplayed the impact that living in the tenancy, with the abuse, threats and fear that was instilled by the [antisocial] tenants. The tenant did not feel the landlord took their complaints seriously, and I can understand why they feel that way."
Woodhouse ordered Kāinga Ora to pay the tenant $6000 in compensation and damages.
Minister of Housing Chris Bishop said Kāinga Ora needed to be a better landlord.
"There are many communities around the country that are sick to their back teeth of disruptive Kāinga Ora tenants."
Asked whether it was acceptable for Kāinga Ora to be paying thousands of taxpayer dollars to tenants aggrieved by its other tenants, Bishop said New Zealanders would be "pretty appalled".
"All of this is avoidable if Kāinga used the tools at its disposal under the Residential Tenancies Act."
Chris Bishop says the housing agency has the tools to evict unruly tenants. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver
In a statement, Kāinga Ora regional director John Tubberty said it made repeated efforts to address its tenants' disruptive behaviour.
"Prior to the [balcony] incident, our team had visited the property on six occasions, but they were unable to engage directly with the customer at the centre of the allegations to get their account of what was happening.
"On each occasion they left a letter outlining the concerns and requesting a meeting."
However, Tubberty accepted the tribunal's finding that "we could have moved to termination sooner".
"We are changing our approach to how we manage disruptive behaviour, in line with the expectation given to us by the Government.
"As part of this changed approach, we will be accelerating the process of terminating tenancies in severe or persistent cases."
Disruptive and antisocial tenants were the inspiration behind the government's ordering of Kāinga Ora to ditch its sustaining tenancies framework, which aimed to prevent homelessness by funding services for people at risk of losing their tenancy.
The framework was set up by the previous National government in 2017 to reduce evictions, but in March, Bishop admitted it "hadn't worked" as there were no incentives for tenants to change their behaviour.
In 2023, only three tenants were evicted from social housing despite Kāinga Ora receiving 335 serious complaints per month.
Sir Bill English is leading a review of Kāinga Ora. Until his recommendations are made, the government has sent the agency a letter asking it to strengthen its management of disruptive tenants.
It is estimated about 100,000 people are experiencing homelessness, with more than 25,000 on the Kāinga Ora social housing wait list.
This story was first published by Stuff.