By Yashanshi Kala with additional white middle-class cis mansplaining by James Raffan
We thought about writing a news story with the title “Severe Shortage of Rental Properties for Students” and then we realised the obvious. Students know their lives are shit and their rent is going up. Sure we could throw in some cute anecdotal facts like the egg shortage and price gouging is creating more vegans but again, do you really need Nexus to tell you how shit your own situation is?
So instead we are going to devote some valuable news real estate to figuring out the key drivers for it, both economic and political, get some experts involved where we can, and finally throw out some solutions.Because here at Nexus we don’t just report the news, we change lives.
SO WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
According to Jason Waugh, the General Manager of Lodge City Rentals “The company has operated at around a 99% occupancy rate.” Add to this the fact that the average weekly rent in March 2013 was $288 in Hamilton. In 2023, ten years later, the average weekly rent is $459. This $459 property still doesn’t guarantee a parking space. Which would be fine if Student Allowances, Minimum Wage, or a Living Wage had grown at the same rate. Spoiler alert, it fucking hasn’t.
If this wasn’t bad enough, a supermarket duopoly that is essentially ensuring that you can’t eat healthy and have a roof over your head without sacrificing study for a thirty hour week and a relatively low unemployment rate coupled with a significant ‘under-employment” rate and you have a doom scenario before you even uncontrollably spiral into the US not passing the debt ceiling, Scotland joining the EU, or David Seymour finally losing his virginity, all of which would surely be economic and moral indicators of the apocalypse.
There are, of course, some political factors too. Former Hamilton Mayor Andrew King and his Peacokes project that he came just short of calling “fuck the poor let them have Harowfield, we all want lifestyle blocks now”
Labour gave students a $50 a week boost in their student allowance and a few weeks later the average rental price in Waikato’s student neighbourhoods increased by $45!
Then there is the fact that whichever God you pray to hates Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown and a combination of his boomer energy and ecological disaster has led to record relocation.
The consumer prices in Auckland are 15% higher than in Hamilton, this is without rent. With rent, the consumer price in Auckland is 25.8% higher than Hamilton. With a significant increase of rent in Auckland, which is 57.9% higher than Hamilton. From groceries, gas, restaurants, to local power, everything is expensive compared to Kirikiriroa. The source, Numbeo suggests “you would need around $8,680 in Auckland to maintain the same standard of life that you can have with $6,900 in Hamilton.” Fuck them all for improving the expressway and making it easy to live here and work there.
WE GET IT, BUT WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT IT?
And this is where Nexus departs from the other student magazines like Critic and Salient or trusted institutions like Stuff and the Spinoff. Where they may report the news with facts, figures and correctly attributed quotes we don’t just tell you student life sucks we fix it.
The simplest solution is to either vote, or stop voting for those who don’t align with your interests. There are parties in this election that want to give you a Universal Basic Income, rent to own, place capital gains on second houses and investment properties, entrust housing care to Iwi, deliver free education and generally fix student issues… Then there is ACT.
Let’s be real here though, whether it is the next government or local government you need to vote. In last year’s Hamilton East Ward the leading candidate got 2953 votes. Nobody cares about students because we haven’t made it necessary to care about students.
Housing, Cost of Living, public transport, free education and a fairer system are all on the ballot in every election but things only change when you want them to. Nexus isn’t telling you to vote. It is telling you to read. Read every policy, every statement, and then decide if you are happy with a lack of affordable rental properties. If you aren’t then vote.
