Posts by DexterX
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Southerly: Tower Insurance Have Some Bad…, in reply to Jeremy Andrew,
I don't think that there is any intention on the part of Tower to rebuild in the circumstances.
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The gin trap.
In reviewing things over the last few days I can't help think that the deal the Govt, Council, EQC and Insurance industry have done is ill conceived, by this quasi mediation that did not appear to involve independent resourced representatives on the part of the insured (home/ppty owners). The solution found is to remove the insured legal rights subject to the 9-month consideration period.
I would have thought to be fair to everyone the “big issues” could have been presented to the courts on a case stated basis to provide an “open” point of reference for everyone. In the absence of this then a judicial review of the scheme may be a possibility – the disclosure would be interesting.
My reading of total replacement is that the homeowner should be able to have the home that they insured rebuilt.
This link is worthwhile:
http://www.bnl.co.nz/settling-large-insurance-claims.html
The article I refer to above states;
"Most policies also provide for a home to be rebuilt on different land (up to what it would have cost the insurer to build it on the existing section). If this is the case then Mrs A could possibly elect to rebuild her home on a new section, which would almost certainly be worth much more to her than $335,000 + $75,000 offered by her insurer."
Pegging values at 2007 GVs is cruel, on two counts;
Firstly although we have had a recession since 2008 – recessions are in effect recessions in the value of wages, a retraction of purchasing power. Consider that although the volume of residential building consents has been down to almost half of what it was pre recession, this doesn’t mean the cost of materials is fixed or decreases, what often happens is that the cost of the materials will rise to compensate for the lost margins lost. The people that own "the plant" still need to cover their overheads and make a profit so this is how they likely do it - since 2008 looking at one strand of materials there was an increase of 25% in 2008 and a further increase of 15% in 2009 and then GST.
Secondly by the time the rebuild gets underway the insured will have substantially less – the new subdivision are likely to be ready sometime it will be 2012/2013 any settlement an insured rec’d based on 2007 GVs is five to six year out of date – the cost of rebuilding is likely to be significantly greater, the pay out to the insured from whatever source is likely to be first be applied in settling mtges and other charges.
In essence the platform has been set for some people to lose a half to two thirds of the value of their “homes”.
There will be no logjam as a result.
There should be all sorts of safeguards I can think of that should be going into the solution - one example could be that say if you are going to have compensation based on 2007 land values then the value of the average section during the rebuild should be based on those 2007 land values.
This could even mean that the govt establish the land to be developed as essential public works.
I hope that this isn't too negative a take on things, but there is a lack of leadership and thought.
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When the news should be the basis for the chorus of dissent the NZ Herald editorial, " A time for making new starts" reads as National Party press release.
I hate how editorial writing is never ascribed to anyone – the “great” anonymous point of view.
http://msn.nzherald.co.nz/nz-government/news/article.cfm?c_id=144&objectid=10734522
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Southerly: Tower Insurance Have Some Bad…, in reply to rcg25,
The liability would likely result from the issue of permits/consents to develop the land which was found to be unstable - duty of care blah, blah, blah..
About 30 years ago I acted for a family group in a situation where a corner of the new home they had built had sunk. The engineers report and investigation found that the section sold was poorly compacted and hadn’t settled (it might have even been a council dump).
The settlement that was reached was that the council met the cost of remediation of the land and the repairs to fix the house and the client’s costs to the date of completion of repair and in consideration of this the client then indemnified the Council from further loss/damage.
The Council was one of the lesser Auckland Councils and it was a “time” where setting things right and looking after people were paramount in local government and public service.
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David my heart goes out to you and everyone in Christchurch..
To preserve the “heritage character” of the city, I would have thought the Govt and Territorial Authorities would have factored into the equation/scheme a capacity to re-locate older repairable dwellings and building of architectural merit to a suitable “new” location – the creation of new heritage suburb or similar type of projects.
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On the matter I don't support legalisation of Marijuana, the dealing of and sale should remain illegal. Decriminalisation, with the sale or supply to minors being criminal bearing in mind the bottom run of the drug pyramid is yoof, makes more sense to me..
With Marijuana being “illegal” it is more marketable as a form of rebellion against the man, and this masks the fact that it is a stupefier and not at all like this:
(Stoners being sent to a hippy happy nirvana heaven somewhere in the middle of the desert plateau where they can grow and smoke their own, sit on the same furniture they were sitting on when they first left school, telling the same stories over and over and over, laughing at the same joke and dancing in the street and loving everybody – just as long as they get to live far away from me when they crank the stereo up and vegetate to Pink Floyd)
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Just like to say I support Garf George 100% - and yes it can be arranged.
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This made me laugh - I was going to do a wee post on nature of addiction, the predisposition of a % of the populace to addiction, and criminal offending and found this:
Monkey see monkey do - research - "where monkeys are trained to develop serious drug addition"
I feel they could have got human volunteers - whether they would have paid above the adult minimum wage is another thing.
Blah.
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Hard News: What the kids do, in reply to Damian Christie,
Addiction is the health problem.
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I would favor an “environment” where a weighted guesstimate of the public health and potential harm costs of psycho active substances, including alcohol, are passed directly onto the manufacturer and suppliers of psychoactive products in the form of a tax.
Those cost guesstimate should include what is likely to be actually required to deal with the “problems” and not based on the level of service/cost that is presently delivered.
A ban on the advertising of the psychoactive substances particularly at the point of sale, the points of sale have to be licensed, with “community boards” controlling the licensing given a strict set of guidelines. The emphasis upon the licensing would be on not repeating the situation where liquor outlets spring up like mushrooms in mushroom season.
The local licensing boards include representatives from the local police and mental health teams, with it being an offence to lobby in support of applications for licensing.
The fines for any outlets selling to minors should be substantive perhaps starting in the order of $100,000 per offence and a permanent cancellation of the license.
In looking at an age limit, then the age at which ones ceases to be a minor, 20 years seems OK to me.
The part problem of the parenting of teens is they get conflicting messages, particularly at the time they reset their core values and outlook, the default setting of “what the kids do” doesn’t have to automatically lean towards being wasted youth or spending ones youth wasted.
With reference to "School daze" - Personally I couldn’t afford the cost or resultant time lost from a weekend where a $40.00 trip was a factor; in some “peer circles” where this has become the norm for teens is unsettling.