KEY POINTS:
Your home, the main asset in your life, around which all your future financial plans revolve, suddenly becomes unfit for habitation, costs hundreds of thousands of dollars just to keep standing and ultimately becomes unsaleable.
It sounds like a nightmare, but it's a daily reality for thousands of New Zealanders caught in the leaky homes crisis - a situation one expert now describes as a national disaster.
John Gray, president of the Homeowners and Buyers Association, estimates that up to 80,000 houses around the country are affected. The repair bill, for which nobody will admit responsibility, is expected to run into billions of dollars.
Behind the numbers are people who, through no fault of their own, find themselves paying for and trying to live in leaky homes.
They routinely describe their predicament as a nightmare.
The stress of watching their financial future disappear into a black hole of legal bills, home repairs and temporary accommodation has damaged the mental and physical health of some victims, leading to depression and even suicide.
Many have contacted the Herald on Sunday with similar stories; one has considered suicide, another's daughters have been forced to leave the country to try to earn money to pay the repairs on leaky apartments.
All express a wish for someone to step up and take responsibility for the crisis and to make financial assistance more readily available.
Gray says the issues uncovered so far are just the "tip of the iceberg" and with the 10-year deadline from the date of completion to register homes as leaky, thousands of people in the future could find themselves in rotting, worthless homes with no recourse to the Weathertight Homes Resolution Service (WHRS) or the courts.
Helen Osborne sits amid the chaos of her home in Newmarket, Auckland, contemplating what might have been. The $900,000 house is being entirely reclad, after the original monolithic cladding was stripped away. The interior is being completely restored after a leaking problem she describes as "like Niagara Falls".
"I used to get up in the night and water would be literally pouring down the inside walls."
So far, the repairs have cost about $300,000. Osborne, a business co-ordinator, is living in rented accommodation after dust from the building caused her to pass out. Her husband lives on-site to prevent burglary.
"We've got past the hysterical crying stage," she says.
The WHRS has three times rejected their case for redress deeming them ineligible because they didn't register the house as a leaky building within 10 years of its completion, a decision they are challenging.
"We believe this is our last chance to have any remote hope of getting any money from those concerned, that we believe are responsible for our leaky home," says Osborne.
Even when the house is eventually finished, the couple face a difficult future. They would have to sell it for a huge price to recoup their losses.
"It has been incredibly stressful, financially draining and like living a nightmare on a daily basis.
"We could only wish we had never purchased the property and that life was a little different. To get any assistance from the organisation set up to help such homeowners as ourselves is proving incredibly difficult.
"The Government must take some responsibility, as must the councils for allowing houses to be built with sub-standard products, and for the council failing to check that what was being built was correct.
"We desperately need to get a lifeline from someone."
Melanie Gortner-Walker and her family from Coatesville are 15 weeks into the repair of their leaky home, originally covered with monolithic cladding.
"We have been living with no windows or doors for the worst of this winter's weather," she says.
"It's freezing, and there isn't much point putting the heater on because the heat just goes straight out of the tarp-covered holes where our joinery should be."
Gortner-Walker says the house was given a certificate of compliance in 2000 by Rodney District Council. Three years later the leaks started. Rot was found during repair work.
'"Every window and door in the house had flashings that were incorrect and leaking and the whole house's cladding did not have ground clearance," she says. The cladding had met the soil and soaked up moisture, rotting the building's frame.
"There were many serious building and design flaws contributing to severely rotted areas of our home, and over 25 per cent of the house's framing was already rotten.
"Apart from the little leak in our kitchen we had no idea of the silent cancer that was slowly ruining our cherished, lovely-looking home.
"When the engineer had fungus and mould tests done that came back with results telling us that we had carcinogenic moulds growing in the linings of our walls, it really hit home," she says.
The family lodged a claim with the WHRS immediately, only to be told the first part may have been built six months before the 10-year cutoff.
The repair bill could be as high as $350,000 and the effect on the family has been devastating.
"This home belongs to my 77-year-old mother and father," says Gortner-Walker. "They bought it to retire to with me and my family. Eight years on, my parents are still not able to come to live here."
The family has suffered health problems that Gortner-Walker believes are related to the leaking.
"I worry constantly. I carry around extreme guilt for putting my parents and my family in this situation. This stress has strained relationships in our family to the point where my partner and I are in therapy.
"We have been living this nightmare for over three years and the struggle for compensation still lies ahead. It is school holidays this week. Our three kids are here all day and there is not a room where it is not a chaotic construction site. It's pouring rain outside, freezing cold and there is nowhere for them to play or just be.
"We are in financial ruin. In the last month we have hit rock bottom. My parents are going to have to sell the home they live in now to pay for our repair.
"They are on a pension and we are only managing to live and service our existing debts, we simply cannot afford the interest payments on the repair loan.
"The property market is at an alltime low right now and my parents' house is not selling. I'm scared."
Eric Ryda from Albany has been living with the stress of his leaky home problem for two years.
When he and his wife bought their new house nine years ago, they believed it had a certificate of compliance. They later discovered it had been revoked.
They are facing a bill of between $150,000 to $200,000 just to get a certificate so they can sell the house.
"All of that money, we've had to borrow."
He says they were ready to start work but were further frustrated by their local council taking more than 10 weeks to process a building consent application.
Ryda says the problem has caused him to "look inward with despair".
He believes he is coping, with a bank loan to fund the work that has pushed him "to the edge".
"The reality is that my and my wife's every thought, our plans, our dreams are coloured by the fact that our only real asset is worthless in the state that it is in."
Ryda hopes the crisis will become an election issue.
"Someone needs to provide some meaningful support to families like mine," he says.
"I don't want handouts, I need a quick, simple resolution that calls those who are responsible for the situation to account."
Maree Vaile and her husband bought an apartment in a block of six in Hamilton. So far, they have spent $180,000 on repairs, which have been ongoing for 14 months.
At their daughter's birthday party a year ago, water was pouring through the air conditioning cavities in the dining/lounge room because the guttering had been removed in the rebuilding process.
"It was raining so hard that the roof could not keep up with it," Vaile says.
"Buckets had to be emptied every 30 minutes to one hour, even through the night.
"Our visitors could not believe we lived in such a mess.
"My son slept for six months last winter with a 20cm gap under the French doors in his bedroom."
Vaile suffers from breast cancer, exacerbated by stress, and is unable to afford a new drug that offers hope for her condition.
She and her husband have tripled their mortgage because the other members in the complex have voted to have the buildings fixed before applying to the WHRS.
"We have had to borrow the interest on our loan and our biggest fear is what happens when that money runs out and there is money due to the bank," she says.
Vaile still has no idea when the repairs will be finished.
"Just as we thought the inside was fixed, the shower in the ensuite fell through the floor. "The builder said the developer had not used any waterproofing materials or sealed the shower correctly. That is another $3000 we had not budgeted on.
"To describe this as extremely stressful is an understatement. It is living hell."
