KEY POINTS:
DIY enthusiasts may soon have to list home improvements on their LIM reports as a warning to prospective buyers.
Building Issues Minister Clayton Cosgrove says buyers should be told if a home was not built by a licensed builder, and proposes recording it on the Land Information Memorandum
- a report on a property held by local councils.
Mr Cosgrove also wants to restrict the work home improvement enthusiasts can tackle to simple constructions, such as a basic home, bach, farm shed or sleep-out. He said the restrictions were yet to be defined.
"It may be that we say if it's the bach or basic family home with eaves and flashing, it's alright, but if you want to get into the Sky Tower or a three-storey place with cantilevered decks and monolithic cladding then taihoa."
The measures are intended as a compromise between the rights of DIY-ers and calls by builders to ban DIY in the midst of wide-ranging reforms in the building industry in the wake of the leaky homes saga.
In November, the Government will begin a new voluntary licensing regime for builders, which Mr Cosgrove says is "aimed at weeding out the cowboys".
Under the Building Act, from 2009 only licensed builders will be able to do certain work.
Registered Master Builders Federation chief executive Pieter Burghout said allowing DIY to continue would undermine the reforms to ensure quality.
But the LIM record would act as a powerful disincentive for people employing unlicensed builders or building their own homes because of the likely effect on its value.
Mr Cosgrove said those provisions did not lock out the DIY tradition and not all construction would be restricted to builders.
The National Party's spokesman on building, Nick Smith, said the proposals were a "u-turn" by the minister, who was trying to wiggle out of provisions in the act which effectively barred DIY work.
"DIY-ers should never have been banned because they were not responsible for the leaky homes fiasco. This substitutes the ban with a requirement to include the work on the LIM."
Mr Cosgrove said it was impossible to stop people doing their own work.
"Short of following everyone home from Carters or Placemakers and checking what they are up to, there is nothing we can do."
He said most people tackled only basic constructions and still had to get the necessary consents and sign-offs.
Real Estate Institute president Murray Cleland said: "If it hasn't had council inspection, you should be very, very wary."