Invercargill's Deepening Housing Crisis
There is an old saying that "to assume will make an ASS of U and ME" and this is so true of Invercargill and Southland's housing. Invercargill is experiencing a slow population growth compared to the rest of the country and house prices are amongst the lowest too. Add that to the facts that Invercargill's population was around 2,000 greater in 1980, 11 schools were closed in 2005 and the Southland Regional Development Strategy's key goal was to increase the region's population by 10,000 by 2025, it would be reasonable to presume that housing supply would not be an issue. Given the city's relatively static population the National Government chose Invercargill as one of the cities to lead its state housing asset sell off in 2015 . In the 1980s the region had over 800 state houses and after continuous divestment, the remaining 360 were to be sold to a private or NGO social housing provider. At that time only a handful of people in Invercargill wer