'Very cold, very damp and very stressful - Kāinga Ora tenant left with no hot water for days

RNZ News

24-06-2025

The damage inside Kate's Mosgiel home.
Photo:
RNZ / Tess Brunton
A Otago mother and her son who has a disability were stuck living in a cold, dark and wet Kāinga Ora house for nearly a week after a hot water cylinder burst.
Katie - who RNZ is only identifying by her first name - said she was forced to bathe and change her 17-year-old son Alex, who has epilepsy and severe autism, in the dark and in the presence of contractors working to fix the flood damage at the Mosgiel state house.
With her property manager on leave, Katie waited for four days before asking Kāinga Ora for a safe place to stay because she did not know who else to contact.
"It was very cold, very damp and very stressful," she said.
Kāinga Ora then offered her a motel, but she said it did not meet Alex's care or security needs and she had to find an Airbnb herself when the agency did not offer her an alternative.
Kāinga Ora has acknowledged it made the wrong call by not immediately offering her family alternative accommodation, given the extent of the damage and the specific needs of her son, and apologised for the stress and inconvenience caused.
It was the middle of the night when Katie woke to the sound of water coming from her hallway on 12 June.
"Just a torrent of water coming down from the middle light fitting and I could hear the sound of electrical sort of zapping, clicking noise and quickly realised that water was also originating from every crack and every corner in this space," she said.
She grabbed buckets before discovering hot water was also leaking along the walls.
Katie flicked off the circuits and called the 0800 housing support number, with a plumber and an electrician arriving before sunrise.
The damage inside Kate's Mosgiel home.
Photo:
RNZ / Tess Brunton
Power was cut to half of the house, including the kitchen, laundry and bathroom where she changed Alex who was incontinent.
When Katie contacted her property manager via email, she received a message saying she was on leave until 16 June, leaving her in a damp house wondering what to do.
She said she was at a loss as to who else to contact, because she had already called the 0800 housing number and the manager.
Workers arrived with noisy industrial fans to try to dry the house.
Katie said she and her son stayed because they did not have anywhere else to go with their two dogs.
"I was really nervous because my son has severe epilepsy and he has multiple seizures a day - many, like probably dozens - I was genuinely concerned that he was going to trip over the drying gear," she said.
Katie said the situation was a sensory nightmare for her son and she found it stressful trying to care for him while contractors worked at the property.
All of the drying equipment was removed after a few days because the workers could see it was unsafe, Katie said.
The house had running water but an electrician later returned to fix the lighting and hot water cylinder because the water would occasionally run near boiling point.
A linen cupboard filled with incontinence products for her son and towels was soaked with the hot, dirty, smelly water.
The carpet was ripped up, exposing sharp tacks that lined the hallway, muck and dirt.
The window above Alex's bed.
Photo:
RNZ / Tess Brunton
Weeks earlier, a window above Alex's bed was broken during a King's Birthday weekend storm.
Katie said a board covered the window for three weeks because she could not find someone to fix the it, at the same time as temperatures dipped below zero, dampness from the burst hot water cylinder and insulation was removed because of flood damage.
"Despite having the fire on, the heat pump running, all the extra heaters I could find, I was waking up to internal ice on the windows and last week we had a particularly cold couple of days, one of the days was -5.6 (degrees) out here and it was becoming increasingly hard to heat this house that was so wet," she said.
Eventually she booked an Airbnb herself.
She was grateful contents insurance covered the $1700 bill, even though it was hard to scrape together the $250 excess.
During a phone call with her property manager last Tuesday, Katie said she was told her that her rent would be waived.
The following day her property manager told her in an email seen by RNZ that she would only be refunded for power expenses as a result of the dryers and still needed to pay her rent.
The communication was inconsistent and frustrating, she said.
On Monday Kāinga Ora backtracked, saying she would not be left out of pocket and it would cover all costs including the temporary accommodation she organised after the agency's motel offer did not meet her son's needs.
Katie said Kāinga Ora needed to have key contacts, clear plans and alternative accommodation options for people with disabilities.
Alex was now unwell with a cold, which she said was not helped by living in a cold, damp house in winter.
Katie contacted Taieri MP Ingrid Leary for support and believed the improved progress and communication was a result of briefing her local MP.
"It adds to the extra feeling of vulnerability that I am not enough in terms of my communication with Kāinga Ora. That it's taken a third party to get involved and put a bit of pressure on," she said.
Leary said there a shortage of emergency housing in Dunedin, which meant vulnerable people could fall through the cracks.
"The issue here is that it took four days for there to be any response to somebody with a vulnerable family, living in a house with limited electricity," she said.
The damage inside Kate's Mosgiel home.
Photo:
RNZ / Tess Brunton
Kāinga Ora Otago, Southland and South Canterbury regional director Kerrie Young apologised for the stress and inconvenience caused, saying the family's experience did not meet Kāinga Ora's expectations.
"While we did get maintenance crews around to the property within a matter of hours of the hot water cylinder bursting to make some initial repairs, we made the wrong call in not immediately offering the tenant alternative accommodation," she said.
Work was underway to fix the damage with the aim of having the home ready for the family to return on Wednesday, Young said.
"This is our contractor's best estimate as there is still work underway that needs to be completed. The contractor understands the urgency of the situation and is prioritising this work," she said.
Young said Kāinga Ora would keep the family updated and offer her any support during this "unsettling time".
"We are working with our maintenance partners to understand where our process went wrong so that we can make sure this does not happen again."
Young said Kāinga Ora had been in contact with Katie to confirm they would cover all of her expenses.
Housing Minister Chris Bishop said he understood Kāinga Ora had apologised for the stress and inconvenience caused to the family and "acknowledged that the service offered did not meet their own standards - and nor did it meet mine".
"I understand Kāinga Ora is also looking at their processes to ensure this does not happen again."
The government cancelled 10 Kāinga Ora state housing projects - about 120 homes - in Dunedin last week.
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