Ashburton Guardian, Monday, September 24, 2018

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Monday, Sept 24, 2018

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Meth test mania costs landlords BY SUE NEWMAN

SUE.N@THEGUARDIAN.CO.NZ

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An Ashburton landlord says he has spent about $24,000 to remediate meth contamination, now considered unnecessary. The rental property market has been following Housing New Zealand’s lead with a zero tolerance policy for its state housing tenants. But a report out last week says the agency misused health guidelines that led to an estimated 2500 people being kicked out of about 800 state homes. The report found remediation was only needed in homes that had been used for the manufacture of the illegal drug or where meth had been heavily used. Ashburton’s Paul Dyas is among land-

lords around the country who have also been caught by the testing regime and unnecessarily spent thousands of dollars. Dyas estimates he has spent $24,300 on remediating one property alone, including $8000 for decontamination, $3500 for painting and $12,300 on curtains and carpets. He says the work cost close to the rent he had earned in a year from the property. He had the house tested when he put the property on the market. A prospective buyer said he believed it had been a drug house and that he wouldn’t consider a sale until it was tested. Dyas obliged. “I said at the time, this is a lot of crock, how is it different to nicotine on walls,” he said.

Dyas went along with a request to have his rental property tested. The results were positive and he was then faced with a $500 bill for testing, plus the cost of cleaning his rental. “Yes, it was my own fault for letting it to idiots, to druggies, but how do you know? Now I’ve had to spend money I didn’t need to spend,” he said. Questions were raised over the value of meth testing earlier this year by the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Adviser who said the risk to health was low in most cases. Mould, he said, was far more dangerous than meth.

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