Nick Clark: Revenue sharing - a path to housing growth?

New Zealand's housing crisis has long been a bugbear for policymakers, affecting a wide range of policy areas beyond housing itself.

Almost everyone sees a serious problem, but addressing it continues to be hampered by a fundamental misalignment of incentives between central and local government. Put simply, councils often view growth as a cost rather than a benefit.

Kerre Woodham: We need more homes but we need to do it properly

The Government will officially announce this morning a plan “to flood the market” with land for development in a bid to end New Zealand's housing crisis. Chris Bishop will use a speech to the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand later this morning, to announce a slew of changes to New Zealand's planning laws. He wants to flood the market with affordable land to develop and to make it easier and cheaper to develop that land into housing as he told Mike Hosking this morning.

Cam Slater: Good Point You Raise There, Matthew

Last week Chris Bishop said out loud what no politician ever wants to be heard, by anyone, but especially home owners. He said he wanted house prices to drop significantly. Matthew Hooton writes about that in his weekly column at the NZ Herald:

Dr Oliver Hartwich: Kiwi minister shows the world how to solve housing crisis

If you are an Australian struggling to afford a home, I have good news from across the ditch: New Zealand is building its way out of its housing crisis. And the solutions being pioneered here also offer a roadmap for solving Australia’s housing woes.

Rewind a few years. New Zealand’s housing market was synonymous with unaffordability. Auckland, our largest city, routinely ranked among the most expensive in the world. Kiwi families found themselves locked out of the housing market. Homeownership plummeted. Homelessness soared. The dream of owning a quarter-acre paradise had long slipped away.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: Bishop's pledge to end the housing shortage

Housing policy made significant progress this week. The housing minister, Chris Bishop, addressed the Wellington Chamber of Commerce and released a cabinet paper outlining his plan for solving the housing crisis.

Taken together, we can now see the Government’s comprehensive strategy to increase land availability, incentivise councils through GST revenue sharing, and reform the planning process.