It was pure luck that none of the six flatmates were home at the time. Photo / Supplied
When the photos popped up on her phone, a Browns Bay resident could not believe what she was looking at.
The house she'd left just a couple of hours earlier had a massive hole through it - and a car "parked" pretty much vertically against it.
A painter who had visited the house in preparation for a job on Monday intended to accelerate out of the driveaway and turn right onto the street.
Instead, she reversed.
Security footage from a neighbouring house shows the vehicle reversing up the driveway, crashing through the garage door, zooming across the garage and crashing through the other side of the house.
The driver was taken to hospital but discharged shortly after, without injuries.
"She just got a fright," the resident said.
The crash happened before 9am on Monday. All six people who live in the house were at work by then - which was lucky, otherwise this could very easily be a story about a tragedy, rather than simply a story about a very expensive accident.
"We got told around 9am on Monday. Everyone happened to already be at work," the resident told the Herald.
"She was meant to come out of our driveway to turn right to leave but instead of accelerating, she was in reverse. It completely annihilated everything," she added.
"The landlord had sent a message to us so one of the girls who lives here went back to the flat to see and she took photos," she recalled.
"I couldn't believe it. The whole thing was being downplayed as 'a little bit of damage', then we saw the photos and holy s**t, that's a big hole."
In what can only be described as another stroke of luck, there was no structural damage to the house, which means that everyone can safely live in it.
"We're allowed to stay here but the entire garage is no longer in use and neither is the lounge above it. We've boarded it all up."
The house is being painted to be put on the market but will now need some extra work before that listing goes up.
The new Police Commissioner will also be in attendance.