An accusation the Queenstown Lakes District Council was more worried about its own housing values than focusing on the housing crisis in the region was swiftly rejected yesterday.
Council strategic growth manager Anita Vanstone said that was definitely not the case.
"For me personally it keeps me up at night with what the community has to go through," she said.
She was responding to a query raised during an online housing seminar hosted by the council yesterday that looked at what it was doing about housing.
The council and other speakers with connections to housing outlined partnerships which had been developed and houses which had been built in recent years.
Ms Vanstone said the pressures the Queenstown Lakes region was under over a lack of housing were well known .
Statistics showed 27% of houses in the districts were unoccupied and though houses were being built, many were high-end which did not help reduce the housing pressures.
Last year, 649 houses were built — beyond what was needed — yet there was no reduction in the demand for housing.
There were 860 households on the waiting list for the Queenstown Lakes Community Housing Trust.
Kainga Ora regional director Kerrie Young said all 13 Kainga Ora houses in Queenstown were occupied.
She said that was obviously not a lot but public housing decisions were made on a nationwide basis and were dictated by how many were on the public housing register and where they loved.
In Queenstown just 18 people were on the register, which was fewer than places like Gore, she said.
She said Kainga Ora was looking at housing the most severely disadvantaged, the aged and those with mobility needs.
Queenstown Lakes Community Housing Trust chief executive Julie Scott said the trust had a goal of 1000 homes by 2038 and had housed 253 households so far.
The homes sold to homeowners gave all the benefits of home ownership except the ability to make capital gain. The house remains in community ownership in perpetuity.
The trust was looking at developing 68 homes in the Tewa Banks area near Arrowtown.
In open questions at the end of the seminar, the influence of Airbnb came to the fore and its impact on the rental market.
Ms Vanstone said the council relied on people supplying the council with short-term visitor stay data and that had become difficult to monitor.
She said the council was looking at what happened in some states in Australia.
Ministry of Housing and Urban Development partnership director Rebecca Maplesden said the impact of Airbnb homes across New Zealand was varied so it was difficult to implement change through national legislation.
It was better for local authorities to use their own rules.
Ms Young said when there was no international tourism more houses came back on to the rental market in Queenstown but that had swiftly disappeared with the borders reopened.
The council’s joint housing action plan is out for feedback and submissions close next month.
