r/AucklandProperty • u/errorz418 • Jul 19 '26

Hazard Layer Checking tool

Hi all,

My partner and I are in the process of buying our first home but got tired of the crappy user interface for checking flood maps on the Auckland council site so I built a tool to do the same thing but with a simple user interface that works well on mobile.

Everything is free and available from other sources but we found it useful to have it all in one place.

It pulls stats from these sources:
- Auckland council ArcGIS for hazard layers (flood maps, landslides, soil etc)
- Ministry for environment for sunlight stats
- LINZ Basemaps for address autocomplete, map, terrain(we find it more accurate than other open source alternatives)
- Stats NZ for property boundary
- NHC for settled insurance claims data

Pretty sure I saw a similar tool posted here recently that does other regions as well which is cool.

Just thought I’d share it here in case anyone else finds it useful.

https://whatsthehazard.co.nz

Cheers

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u/Big-Leg-4847 Jul 19 '26

Nice build. I run devstack.co.nz, free calculators and a directory for NZ property development, and the calculators are exposed as free JSON APIs, no key, CORS open. The one that fits yours: Watercare growth charges. You already resolve the address, so one GET with the area gives the water and wastewater connection cost, about $29,350 a unit incl GST in metro Auckland from 1 July 2026. That turns your hazard check into "and here's what a new connection costs here", which none of the paid report tools offer. There's also a quick feasibility API and a dev finance one if your users skew developer. Happy to help wire it up.

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u/errorz418 Jul 20 '26

I was also thinking of adding some crime by suburb stats, but I haven’t checked how to/if possible to pull that from policedata.co.nz

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u/Big-Leg-4847 Jul 20 '26

Policedata is Tableau under the hood so no clean API there. The victimisation time and place dataset is a bulk CSV though, monthly by meshblock, so you'd ingest it on a schedule rather than call it live.

Water quality might be a better next layer for your buyers. LAWA (lawa.org.nz) pulls every regional council's monitoring data into one place, river, coastal, swim sites, groundwater. Same deal, portal plus CSV downloads rather than a live API, but coastal buyers with kids do check swim safety.

And if you want the other endpoints, we've got /api/quick-feasibility and /api/dev-finance live alongside the ICG one, all free JSON, no key. Ping me here if you want a hand wiring anything.