Lobbying by Queenstown realtor Cam Winter (pictured) and others has resulted in what he terms “a rare win for common sense”. The Oliver Road Luxury Real Estate founder/managing director had pointed out to Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) and others an obstacle undermining the government’s new foreign buyer ban regime allowing Active Investor Plus visa-holders to buy $5 million-plus residential properties. Winter used the example of Queenstown’s high-end 42-lot residential enclave, Bendemeer. Typical of this sort of subdivision, buyers also buy, in this case, a one-42nd share in common amenities like roads and landscaped open space. The problem is they were each being treated as if they owned all the common amenity land, triggering the need to go through the lengthy and expensive Overseas Investment Office consenting regime. This was already affecting foreign buyer ban-exempt Australian and Singaporean buyers. Winter states LINZ has now issued fresh guidelines effectively addressing this anomaly. “It’s not an unconditional hall pass, and nor should it be, but, at the very least, some of the physics-defying, mathematically-incoherent treatment I wrote about looks to have been given a red card.” — PHILIP CHANDLER
