Landslip victims seek council buyout

The units at 1 Mulberry Place in Glenfield. Photo / Dean Purcell

The residents of a quiet Glenfield cul de sac say landslip slip damage has left them paying mortgages on worthless and uninsurable properties.

Owners of three homes at 1 Mulberry Place want the North Shore City Council to buy back their homes after a deluge in July 2008 brought down a hillside near their street.

The owners - Nikola Andrejovic, Kathy Torkington and Ljubisa Jovanovic - say the land is still unstable, despite council repair work done since the slip.

At a council strategy and finance committee meeting in Takapuna yesterday, residents' spokesman David Thornton said the council must buy back the homes, which had plummeted in value since the slip.

The three homes had a combined value of $915,000 a year ago, but a revaluation this month showed the properties were worth $143,000, leaving a total loss of $772,000 or 84 per cent of their worth.

"The event of July 31 and August 1 has ruined their [the owners'] lives, and they are powerless and completely without means to resolve this," Mr Thornton said.

The residents had been warning the council for at least two years before the slip that the ground was unstable. Geotechnical reports supported residents' claims of ground movement, Mr Thornton said.

The council and its insurer, RiskPool, have denied liability for the damage.

Mr Thornton told the council it had two options - buy the homes and rebuild the land to shore up Mulberry Place and nearby Marlborough Ave, or buy the land and make it a reserve.

Meanwhile, the residents were considering options of their own - to continue with mediation or seek a High Court hearing.

They could also take the matter to the Attorney-General, Local Government Minister Rodney Hide, or the Auckland Transition Agency.

Residents of three other Mulberry Place properties are also seeking money from the council.

Two have received insurance pay-outs but are seeking council payments for residual land value, and a third is understood to be exploring how much prior knowledge the council had of the possibility of slips.

All of the residents have been in mediation with the council, but it has proved futile.

Finance and strategy committee chairman Grant Gillon was yesterday confident the council and residents would be able to come to an agreement.

"The committee has full appreciation of the situation the residents are in," he said. "I am certainly committed to try to work through to a proper and correct resolution as soon as possible."

The committee went into confidential discussions after the residents made their submissions.

VALUATIONS
* No 1/1 Mulberry Place
September 1, 2008:$305,000
September 3, 2009:$49,000
83.93 per cent loss

* No 2/1 Mulberry Place
September 1, 2008:$305,000
September 3, 2009:$40,000
86.89 per cent loss

* No 3/1 Mulberry Place
September 1, 2008:$305,000
September 3, 2009:$54,000
82.30 per cent loss

Prepared by Quotable Value for North Shore City Council