An Auckland landlord has been ordered to pay over $44,000 in damages for numerous breaches of tenancy law related to their Auckland boarding house.
The property at 113 Beach Road in central Auckland was inspected by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment's Tenancy Compliance and Investigations Team as part of a nationwide initiative following the fire at Wellington's Loafers Lodge in 2023.
The boarding house was referred to as "Beach Road Hostel" by the tenants, many of whom were international students.
Inspectors identified "a range of issues", including a lack of suitable heaters installed.
There was no heater in one of the shared lounge spaces, and no fire evacuation procedures were on display.
The landlord, Beach Road Properties, was issued an improvement notice to address the issues, but failed to do so.
MBIE said the issues affected 20 tenants, and put them "at risk".
TCIT National Manager Brett Wilson said many of the tenants were left living in cold rooms with insufficient heating, potentially affecting their health. He said they were further exploited by being charged bond payments in a way that did not align with the law.
The landlord was taken to the Tenancy Tribunal, where they admitted to several breaches of tenancy law.
The breaches included not having working qualifying heaters installed; entering into tenancy agreements that did not comply with the law; requiring bond amounts of more than one week’s rent and not lodging these bonds with Tenancy Services; failing to comply with an improvement notice; failing to provide specified documents to MBIE on request; and failing to provide mandatory information in tenancy agreements, including insulation statements, healthy homes statements, or insurance statements.
The tribunal adjudicator found that the landlord intentionally failed to comply with the improvement notice. They were ordered to pay $44,450 in exemplary damages.
Beach Road properties agreed to foward all outstanding bond money to the Bond Centre and to repay any rent paid in advance that exceeded what was allowed.
The landlord also agreed to a two-year restraining order from committing the same unlawful acts.
“In my view, it is a matter of significance when a landlord fails to comply with an improvement notice," the adjudicator noted.
"It undercuts the protections that are available for vulnerable tenants and consumes public resources chasing up compliance.”
Wilson said the decision "recognises the real impact non‑compliance has on people’s lives".
"Tenants deserve to live in warm, dry and safe homes, and while TCIT seeks to work with landlords, decisive action will be taken when required improvements or requests are ignored, particularly in boarding houses where strong protections are essential.”
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