Have you looked at https://policy.nz? It's just depressing! Not one political party has a comprehensive idea as to solve the problems they talk about when trying to influence voters.

So do we or do we not have a housing problem? Depends if you own or not? With interest rates so low it's clear occupying a home is half the cost it was 2 years ago and one third the cost of 10 years ago. So existing home owners don't see a problem.

Sure houses and land are going up and it's so simple as to why. Holding land and obtaining consents for large projects costs a fortune. Those costs can be close to 30% of the sale price of each dwelling. 30% is absurd when land is zoned, and supposedly has infrastructure to cope.

Here is the main problem. Council still controls consents and cannot supply infrastructure. Any large project needs to pay for this infrastructure and usually the Council hasn't even planned it. It's not unusual for Councils’ to demand new road upgrades, water supply, stormwater and wastewater that services an entire catchment not just the developers block. The developer has to pay for it otherwise no resource consent and yes, you the buyers pay for it as part of house buying.

Let's be realistic, this is the real reason housing is so expensive. The RMA should be renamed the Home Buyers Pay for Resources Act!

So political parties, it's time to get real - and don't, election cycle after election cycle, give us the same lame excuses and even lamer solutions.

Council's just won't pay for infrastructure so home buyers have to.

End of story!