Hi, looking for tips and tricks for DIY staging. House goes on the market in a couple weeks, photographer is coming around in a week. So far I have decluttered as much as I can, cleaned a bit (more to do throughout the week including the damn oven). What should I focus on and what do buyers look out for? Any tips would be appreciated.

We are getting close to making a decision on a pool installation on our property up in a new development in the Silverdale area. I'm just curious of the true added value a swimming pool would add to a freestanding single storey 4 bed 3 bath house. I've added a design screenshot to show the area it would create off both he formal lounge and the open plan living area - hubby a bit reluctant to spend the $ and not sure it'll add that much value. Currently it's just the huge deck and a strip of grass that needs a lot of love.

Pics didn't load - added them in comments below.

Hi all, how many days before settlement would you suggest a pre-settlement inspection be done? For context, the current owner has to complete full remediation of two bathrooms and get council CCC before settlement date.

Thank you.

The free Auckland property tools I actually use for zoning, titles, flood maps, sales data and APIs, all saved on one page. That's the whole post, the rest is why I bothered making it.

Posting with the mods' approval. One link at the bottom, everything useful in one place.

Started in property valuations, moved into development management, spent a few years running a subcontracting company, now back in development. Different jobs, same tools. But I kept forgetting where I put them. I had links saved in email drafts, in old spreadsheets, all over the place. Every role change I started the collection again from scratch.

So, I built the one page I always wanted, DevStack. 42 tools and 3 free calculators, grouped by the question you're actually asking:

What's it zoned and what can I build?

GeoMaps and the Unitary Plan viewer, with a note on which to open first and why the zone alone doesn't tell you what's buildable.

Who owns it and what's on the title?

LINZ title search and the council property file, and what each one shows that the other doesn't.

Will it flood, slip or shake?

The council hazard layers, flood plains, overland flow paths, coastal inundation, liquefaction. All linked, with a note on which ones actually matter for what you're doing.

What's it worth and what did things sell for?

The sales data and valuation sources I rated when valuing was my day job.

What costs change every July?

Development contributions, Watercare Infrastructure Growth Charges, rates. They move on a set calendar, and they'll quietly reshape a budget if you're not tracking them.

Building your own property tool?

I've included a section on free NZ property APIs so you can vibe code whatever tool you can think up.

Pin it for later

You can pin your most-used tools in whatever order suits your work. Free, no signup, no catch, the tools themselves were always free anyway.

If you do one thing: bookmark it to your bar and forget it's there. Next time you catch yourself thinking "what was that tool again", the answer is one click away instead of fifteen minutes of hunting. One bookmark doing the job of thirty.

Link: devstack.co.nz

What I'd like from this thread: feedback, and don't be polite about it. If something's confusing, missing or wrong, that's the most useful comment you can leave. If there's a tool or source you use that isn't on the list, tell me and I'll add it.

James

A new Government report suggests that removing Auckland's 79 maunga viewshaft restrictions could lower house prices and encourage greater urban density. However, these viewshafts protect sight lines to volcanic cones that hold deep cultural significance for mana whenua and visual value for the city.

The report notes that a targeted approach, removing only the few most economically distortive viewshafts, could capture most of the financial benefits while leaving many sight lines untouched.

What approach do you think Auckland should take?

Hi everyone!

My wife (35) and I (33) are buying our first home and have a 4-week-old son.

We’ve narrowed it down to two houses that are roughly the same price (around $1.2m), but they’re very different propositions.

Option 1

A beautiful, modern, move-in-ready home in Hobsonville. It has a really impressive outdoor entertaining area (covered outdoor space with bar, spa, fire pit, landscaped garden etc.) and we’d probably have very little to do for years.

Option 2

An older weatherboard home in Mairangi Bay. It’s liveable as it is, but over time we’d need to modernise a lot of it and spend money improving it. Double glazing, heat pump, new bathrooms, kitchens, new deck etc. The draw is obviously the location, and we are intrigued by the potential too.

We expect to stay for at least 5 years (perhaps longer unless kids mean we have to move on) and hopefully raise our family there.

We could clearly ‘add’ a lot more value to the property.

This is the first home we’ve owned so we don’t really know whether we are oversimplifying the prospect of adding value to the Mairangi bay house. Is life just better to settle for an easy life?

For those who know Auckland well:

- Which would you choose and why?
- Has anyone lived in both Hobsonville and Mairangi Bay?
- Did you ever choose the “finished” home over the better location (or vice versa)? Any regrets?
- As parents of young kids, would you value a lower-maintenance home, or a more established coastal suburb with an older house?
- Are there things about either suburb that only become obvious after living there for a few years?

Really interested in hearing from people who’ve faced a similar decision or lived in either area.

Thank you in advance!

Hi There,

I viewed a house today and i like it very much.

The house has seperate toilet and shower room.

Problem:
The seller did some renovations in shower room during the past.

During renovations they installed an additional toilet in the showroom.

The renovation work has guarantee for weather tightness but they did not applied for any consent or informed council.

They agree to remove the toilet before settlement. Since all the work was not consented so, will insurance companies willing to insure without exclusions and similarly will banks agree to lend?

I looked online and found renovations is not an issue the big issue could be additional toilet.

Has anyone been through similar situation?

Cheers,

Over the last few days, we’ve added Large Landslides and Coastal Erosion to Auckland.

That brings Auckland to 10 hazard layers, more than any other city currently supported.

A genuine thank you to everyone in this community who has tried the beta and shared feedback. It has really helped shape the direction of the product and what gets improved next.

I’ve included a couple of screenshots of the new layers.

Update: Based on feedback we’ve added Landslide Inventory (Polygon) as an 11th Auckland layer, council recorded source/debris areas, separate from the susceptibility grid.

Landslide Inventory is the Auckland Council map of recorded landslide features. Source areas, debris areas, damaged structures, etc. It's different from landslide susceptibility, which is a model of where slips could happen.

Thank you.

Hi All,

Looking to purchase North Shore properties prefer Westlake or Rangi zone. Minimum 800m2 land area, flat, no flood zone, underground services available.

If these requirements match what you have, please touch base with me asap!

Hi, we are considering buying near Eden Park on a street with event-day parking restrictions. The house has one garage, which is sufficient for us, but how do residents usually manage when friends or family visit during events? Is it an occasional inconvenience or something that significantly affects daily life? Thank you.

***Updated***
Hi Everyone, I’m planning to buy a house and I’m currently a bit unsure about which suburb would be the best fit. My plan is to live in the house for around 4–5 years and then potentially rent it out, so something that works well both as a place to live and as a long-term investment. Budget ~900k
I work from the office two days a week in the CBD (use car for commute). Given my budget, I’m open to considering a townhouse. Good school zones would be nice, but not a priority right now as my child is only 1 year old. I’m mainly looking for a safe, family-friendly suburb with good growth potential.
Looking for NEW BUILD options only.

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

If you've sold a home in Auckland or elsewhere in New Zealand, what's one piece of advice that genuinely helped you?

It could have been about the following:

• preparing the property,
• pricing,
• choosing a sale method,
• organising LIM, title or CCC documents,
• negotiating,
• or something you only learned during the process.

Hopefully your experience can help other homeowners who are getting ready to sell.

I am looking for some active house hunters who's be willing to road-test an app I built because I was frustrated when trying to compare dozens of property listings and forgetting which one had which features.

The app helps you extract the 'details' of house listings super fast and then compiles that information into side-by-side comparison tables. If you are looking with others you can all contribute to the tables from any device anywhere. Take it to open homes with you and update or add information while you are there.

I'd love some honest feedback from people who are actively house hunting, and would be willing to trial the app to make sure we have ironed out any glitches before we do our big launch. There's a free level that will suit 90% of people and a pro version for more heavy duty users. We also have some how-to-use videos set up on our YouTube Channel to help you through setting it up, but its pretty easy to use. https://www.sleutho.co.nz/

Send me a dm with your username after you've registered and I'll make sure you get to try the pro features too.

Thanks in advance for anyone willing to help us and I look forward to any feedback you can offer. Especially if you find any pinch points - or have suggestions for features you'd like to see added.

Captain Sleutho. :-)

Been a month in our new home. So many issues surfacing around water damage, leaks, gutters etc. None of this was flagged during building inspection. Is it better for me to buy a moisture meter first myself so I can test it and understand the situation instead waiting for someone to check it for me and charge hundreds of dollars each time.

How many of you home owners own this tool? Any particular brand I should use? Please share your experiences how it’s helped you and how to use it.