Fixer-upper
Glenn McConnell visits a $2.76m property tipped to feature on next year’s The Block NZ.
The site of next year’s The Block NZ season is an old fire station that was contaminated with meth.
The likely site of television show The Block NZ 2018 is an old fire station that was contaminated with methamphetamine.
The old fire station in the Auckland suburb of Kingsland had been converted into a 18-room boarding house, but was closed after testing found significant levels of meth contamination.
A former tenant said eviction orders were issued to everyone living there in April.
The building was then sold to Warner Brothers, the production company behind The Block NZ.
Warner Brothers Television bought the Kingsland Station House in August, one month before TV3 owner MediaWorks announced a seventh season of the show would go ahead.
The Block NZ this year achieved its highest ratings since
2013, with an average audience of more than 300,000 people aged between 25 to 54.
Warner Bros bought the
18-room property for $2.76 million. Neighbouring properties were also vacant when Stuff visited in November.
Barfoot & Thompson agent Cam Paterson said in February that the property was an attractive buy because the housing crisis was sure to keep profits high.
‘‘Due to Auckland’s chronic housing shortage, accommodation is in strong demand. And the income [is] set to increase as demand grows due to other boarding facilities making way,’’ he said.
But then the old fire station was sold to start a new chapter – in reality television.
Houses from The Block NZ sell with much fanfare and celebration at prices generally above $1m. Typically, a season of the show results in four high-end family homes. The show’s goal is to produce the most expensive house for auction, in stark contrast to the affordable accommodation of a boarding house.
MediaWorks declined to comment for this story.
When Stuff visited the property, builders on site locked the door. A builder said ‘‘no’’ when approached for comment. The building itself was a completely gutted shell.
Before being sold to Warner Bros, the Kingsland Station House was managed by Ray White as a ‘‘lodge’’. Its rooms went for between $200 and $300 a week, providing a home near Eden Park and central Auckland transport routes for about 20 people.
The boarding house’s yearly revenue was more than $200,000, according to Barfoot & Thompson.
Former tenant Nicholas Keesing said Ray White issued urgent orders for everyone to vacate the property on April 28. He had nowhere to go.
Keesing said he and other tenants were forced to live on the streets after Ray White issued the eviction notice on behalf of owners Yung Gong and Yihan Song. He ended up living across the street by the bus stop on New North Rd.
‘‘I felt quite aggrieved by this. It had been 12, 14 years in Kingsland. It was my home. Then I needed to get out, to find somewhere to live.’’
The property manager knew meth had been cooked in the house, Keesing said, because he was the one reporting dealers to the manager. ‘‘I wanted to clean that place up.’’
But Ray White disputed this claim, saying its tests showed meth was consumed but not cooked in the house.
When Ray White started testing the property and issuing eviction notices, Keesing said: ‘‘They treated us like animals. You have no idea, mate, it was just terrible.’’
Ray White director Gower Buchanan said the company was required to vacate the property after learning of high levels of methamphetamine on April 24.
The seven-day notice period was in line with the law, he said, as the house was deemed ‘‘uninhabitable’’.
Although eviction notices were issued in April, the tenants did not leave until the end of June, he said. ‘‘By not vacating within the original notice period and only finally vacating on 28 June, the tenants put their health at risk, something Ray White Damerell Group wanted to prevent.’’
He said Ray White recommended regular testing for its properties, a policy that led to the April tests. The company didn’t know about contamination before the tests, he said, and it intended to reopen the boarding house when it was cleaned.
‘‘Ray White attempted to find temporary alternative accommodation, including speaking with local marae, for the tenants, with the objective of cleaning and decontaminating the property so the tenants could return to a safe, clean home,’’ Buchanan said.
‘‘The delays caused by the tenants… meant this objective could not be achieved.’’
Meth Solutions director Miles Stratford said the property would have taken weeks to clean up and the house did need to be vacated.
Ray White figures showed 70 per cent of the building was contaminated at four times Ministry of Health guidelines.
Going by those numbers, Stratford agreed it was unlikely that methamphetamine was being cooked in the house.
The house would have only needed to be sprayed down, with the curtains thrown out, Stratford said. He expected the cost to be a ‘‘fair few’’ thousand dollars. –Stuff