Posts by Hebe
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Southerly: Tower Insurance Have Some Bad…, in reply to Tasneem Gould,
Tasneem I agree with Jeanette King; I see no undertaking to look at the issue. In fact, what John Key is saying is "haven't we done well". And on one measure yes, the solution is better than otherwise, and 2007 GV in urban Christchurch in general is a good thing rather than the canned 2010 valuations.
But it's still not good for many people, and just wait until the likes of Clifton, Scarborough, Balmoral and Redcliffs hills are red-zoned; their GVs will be way, way off the selling price, hundreds of thousands in some cases.The issue is whether land that is irrepairable makes the house on it (no matter its physical state) unhabitable. That is what I expect to see in court, unless there is precedent in law to argue this one.
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Hard News: That's Entertainment!, in reply to Geoff Lealand,
Oh. My. God. Yeurch. But I must admit to being on YouTube watching the Jesus and Mary Chain just as the Feb 22 earthquake hit down here.
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Hard News: That's Entertainment!, in reply to Robert Fox,
I was too ripped to leave London. Forgot Glastonbury was on.
Excellent Bono shirt; glad I'm not the only one who just loathes him. -
Southerly: Tower Insurance Have Some Bad…, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
The local insurers have sod all to do with the terms. They are told how to call it all by their reinsurers; the faceless global money men. Christchurch and its home-owners are at the bottom of the food chain.
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Land cover will be binned for all of NZ soon.
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More on my post 2 hours ago: I reckon orange zone owners should be wary. My friend's house in the previous post is orange zone, highly likely to be be reclassified red. Funny that the insurance company now wants to repair when he had definitely been in the rebuild class.
I suspect all orange and white zoners told they are rebuilds will find the insurers "want to reassess them". And the reassessments will not happen until the land is deemed green or red.
So that's the comparatively wealthy hill-dwellers (white zone) in limbo; and they have been hit hard with many, many destroyed houses. The shrieking of what the Govt would consider it's must-have voters will start ringing out across the muntlands within a month. Just in time for a party-vote hammering at the election?
As for collusion among the insurance companies, the deal was stitched up with the reinsurers breathing down the Govt's necks; Brownlee said as much a week or so ago. They'll all be playing off the same song sheet. The only answer is the aggrieved getting together, hiring Mai Chen or someone equally as high-profile, and taking it through the courts. But even then Cera can basically do what it wants wherever it wants with the Minister's say-so.
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Southerly: Tower Insurance Have Some Bad…, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Shaftershocks
Ooh, that is so good.
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Nicky Wagner, one of our local MPs, just very kindly phoned me to semi-confirm what I've been told by Tower. The bit that didn't match is that Tower told me that homeowners could only get their replacement policy if the house had already been condemned; whereas Nicky thought that if the repairs exceeded some theoretical book value then Tower *would* have to pay out for replacement
Even more bastardry from insurers: A friend had been told by the insurer that their house was written off after September 4; the land was to be repaired and the rebuild done. Today was told when ringing the insurer to check it's all proceeding, "Oh no. You're up for reassessment. We'll repair now, not rebuild." His house is near unliveable.
I reckon the Govt and insurers have done a deal making the acceptance of the Govt offer the only way out. Simple; insurers just classify 98% of damage as rebuilds, especially for those with full replacement insurance (everyone who has a bank mortgage is required to have full replacement). That way they don't have to spend the really big money on rebuilds for anyone on red zone land. Paying the Govt a 2007 valuation for an old house is going to be, as David Haywood discovered, far cheaper for the insurer than paying for a rebuild.
Anything can be classified as repair rather than a rebuild by a smart insurance company lawyer.
Solves all a National Govt's problems in one swoop: homeowners get a "generous" offer (the 2007 valuations are far prettier than the 2010 GVs would be), and the insurance companies (and reinsurers: we're subsidising Warren Buffett here) get off lightly.
The only way this one will be fought is multiple-party lawsuits, and a huuuge outcry before the election. Post-election we're all screwed.
Wish I'd finished that law degree.
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Sand is good for earthquakes, absorbs the shockwaves nicely. The problem is river silt (loam) with a high water table. It's lovely to grow gardens in but the water is pushed up through the loosely adhered solid particles to make those sand volcanoes and spewing liquefaction through cracks.
It would cost so much to build in ways to withstand the liquefaction that abandoning the worst areas and giving people a boney, stoney, dry patch of land out west/south would be far cheaper for EQC and the Govt.
Trouble is I don't want to live where the tumbleweeds blow, and I suspect a lot of the Avonside area people don't either, not to mention thhe people in the hill-clearance areas.
Some days I look around and think that all the beautiful and funky bits of the city have gorn, gorn, gorn. So will we just end up a city of real blokes driving double-cab utes?
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Hard News: Christchurch: Square Two, in reply to Kumara Republic,
What happened to PR24s?