PHOTO: Photo: 123rf
Not a single cent has been given out from the government’s $23 million loan scheme for earthquake-prone apartment owners – because no one has applied.
Figures from Kāinga Ora showed no one has even applied for the loan in the 10 months applications have been open.
It has led to complaints the money is “impossible” to access, while one person originally behind the scheme believes it needs a complete re-think.
The Residential Earthquake-Prone Building Financial Assistance Scheme was first announced in Budget 2019, and went live in September 2020.
But it has got off to a slow start.
A 2018 estimate found there were 1261 individual apartments in earthquake-prone buildings within areas of high seismic risk – that number is likely to have risen since.
In November, two and a half months into the scheme’s opening, only 25 Expressions of Interest (EOIs) had been lodged.
Fast forward to today, only 10 more have been lodged since then. None of those EOIs have turned into formal applications.
READ MORE VIA RNZ