The southern South Island wasn’t greatly troubled by leaky homes.
We didn’t have the rash of spec houses, nor many of the low cost-quick builds and look good-work bad designs which contributed to the problem further north.
However, we’ve been caught up in the fallout.
While building a new house on the dairy farm I noticed the height from the livng room’s French doors to the path made the distance when stepping outside a little higher than was comfortable. The builder agreed and said he was going to put a step there.
He said he realised that would be a nuisance and people might trip over it. Raising the path would be better but leaky homes legislations wouldn’t allow that.
It’s one-size fits all so even in North Otago where we get an average rainfall of only 500mls, houses have to be built to withstand Auckland’s torrential downpours.
Nick Smith has said that a National Government might help pay some of the leaky homes bill. I have some sympathy with that given the cost to individuals and local authorities. I would be even more supportive of a fresh look at the legislation to allow some flexibility for local conditions.
Homepaddock 
What happened to caveat emptor?
I had every house I bought inspected for ‘water tightness’ first before buying – and I had to pay for the inspector. Why should I now have to pay- either through tax or rates- for others because other were either too cheap to fork out for an inspection or because they went for a cheaper way to contruct a house.
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I am not an expert on leaky homes but I thought part of the problem was houses were inspected and passed when they shouldn’t have been.
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