News and views

Water quality is no new issue in Aotearoa New Zealand, but it is a growing one. On 31 October 2019, the government closed submissions on the Action Plan for Healthy Waterways. The Plan has since been referred to an independent advisory panel that will consider the public’s submissions and report back to the government.

More tenancy law reform has arrived. Bear with me before rolling your eyes though — these new rules will finally give much-needed clarity to tenant-landlord liabilities for property damage.

Responding to a negative customer review online can be very stressful but a gut reaction and a hastily written reply can cause far more trouble than it's worth.

When a relationship comes to an end, the divvying up of relationship property is no walk in the park. Often it can take months, if not years, for disagreements to be resolved. It’s an emotionally charged time, and it doesn’t help that the law in this area has some relatively blurred lines when it comes to the division of relationship property.

New Zealand has changed significantly over the last half-century. The Property (Relationships) Act 1976 was drafted at a time when couples generally married young and pooled their resources to buy a house as early as they could, a time when ABBA’s ‘Fernando’ topped the national charts and Fred Dagg and Footrot Flats made Kiwis laugh out loud.

Tiny houses are becoming extremely popular nationwide as property prices rise. Less energy consumption, lower environmental impact and cheaper housing, while still leaving room to develop other buildings on a single normal-sized plot. Win-win, right? Not quite.

What do Peter Jackson’s film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and the new Trusts Act 2019 have in common? They’re both around 17 years old!

Change is on the horizon for overseas property investment regulations as the second and final stage of the review of the Overseas Investment Act 2005 gets underway.