STATE HOUSING SCHEME

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 78, 19 April 1937, Page 5

STATE HOUSING SCHEME

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Hastings Plans Sobn To Be Put in Hand PROBABLE RENTALS

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, ' WELLINGTON, Last Night. • 1 I • Activity on the , State housing scheme^ is brisk and extensive. Appxoximateiyi ,800 houses are already in view with the, construction provided for under seVeral contracts in the four main centres,' iwhile tenders will be call^d this month if or similar dwellings in the, secondary towns. . The demand is such as to make •it obvious to tho authorities that - as Imany more will have to be built in the !cities alone before' it can be said that the housing 'shortage is less than acute. •• The costs of the buildings so-far, notwithstanding the all-round increases in wages and prices, are wprking out at, rather less than £1 per square foot.- A1-! •though no official statement' has yet 'been made it is gathered that the rent . of a- four-roomed house will be about 25s a week. This on a comparative basis will mean- tb the tenant' a:saving of at least 11s weekly. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary to the Minister of Finance, Mr. J. A. |Lee, who is carrying out administrative rwork on the Government 's housing seheme, said in an interview that a con•tract had been let for the construction of the initial group ofj some 50 house i in Dunedin. Tke successful tender was that of thd Love Construction Company and the priee compared favourably with the costs of contracts in other centres. There had been some delay over the ; Dunedin seheme, Mr. Lee explained, but this was entirely due to the building contxactors themselves. The Government had agreed ,to adopt a procedure in calling for tenders in Dunedin so as to test the methods of tendering sujgge'sfed by various builders who had. as3u'red the Department of Housing that it would be preferable for contractors to take out the quantities themselves instCad of submitting tenders on the data.supplied by the. department as.was; done for .Wellington and Auckland con-. tracts. The builders contended that if! their methods were adopted many more.tender3 would be received at much bet-; ter prices for the Government. "This advantage to the State, how-, ever, has not been proved," said Mr. Lee.. "We had scarcely taken steps to advertise the. first group of houses in Dunedin before we'had a large number of request's for delay on the plea that each contractor had to extract "his own quantities. The successful construction company had made , its own quantity survey before tendering and its tender, the lowest submitted, compares favourably with the others received throughout New Zealand. There is no dqubt that the number of. tenders was kept down and not increased by the procedure adopted in Dunedin. Ho.wever, the quantities will be made available to the builders in dealing with further contracts. in the largo centres." Mr. Lee mentioned that the Dunedin contract included an experiment in tho building of a double unit house 'under one roof but so constructed as to appe'ar externally as a single unit. In other words two small houses would thus .be provided each with three rooms but with a clear front and.no visible dividing wall. This type of houso would be tried out with a view to meeting the residential needs of childless married people and elderly couples. Unfortunately a separate .tender had not been called for this type of double-nhit honse and it would be some time before the actual cost of the building could be determined. Obviously the subsequent rental value of each . small house in a double unit would be much less than the rent of a single-unit dwelling. Discussing prices, Mr. Lee said that building costs varied as between towns, this being one of the reasons whv the initial prices of the different contracts had not been disclosed. Reli'able intormation in the hands of the Housing Department several months ago gave convincing evidence that building costs were less as a rule in Christchurch and Dunedin than in Auckland and Wellington. In the south, however, particularly 'in Dunedin, many of the basic materials were available at a much lower cost than in other centres. Experienee had shown that the cost of the construction of houses in the Lower Hutt district would work out at. about 19s 8d per square foot. The cheapest houSe would cost £550 and the most expensive type about £1300. Without going into detail Mr. Lee made it clear that the demand for State houses was such that construction would have to be extended not only in the main cities but also in the secouddry towns. ' J

It was hoped to caii . tenders this week for the building of houses in , Palmerston North and Wanganui. ,j Land had been acquired in other ' places all over New Zealand and plans would he in hand soon for the . construction of a group of houses in Hastings where very suitable areas , had been secured by the Govern- : ment. It. was already obvious that within, a jfew months many more houses would have to be provided. Auckland, for instance, would rcquire at least an additional 200. Wellington 's need was no less great, while Christchurch and Dunedin also would require many more than the numbers for the building of , whieh provision had been made. 1 No official information is- as yetj available as to the rents to be charged; for the houses now under construction,; but it is cortain that these will be muchj lower than the rentals for similarl houses built. under the State Advancesj seheme. It has been pointed out thatj for a £1200 house built with a loan at; 4i per cent. for 35 years it costs tho, occupant £1 16s 9d a week. The rent of houses being constructed by the State Housing Department will not runj - to anything like that, even allowing for the marked increase in building costs. In the absence of official "information it may be recalled that when Mr. Lee recently addressed some 2000 citizens at a non-advertised meeting at the Auckland, Town Hall he mentioned that the weekly rent of a four-roomed house in the Government 's seheme • would be slightly in excess of a day's wage for a carpenter employed on building the houses. CarpenteXs at Miramar prob- - ably. are being paid not less than 2s 9d an hour plus half an hour travelling time. On this basis it seems very likely that the rent of a four-roomed honse will.he 25s a. week which ip the rate j thousands of people Ijave .to pay for j crude one-roomed and two-rooined "flats."