Te Kāinga buildings
There are currently three buildings in the Te Kāinga programme and a total of 180 apartments. To check out current vacancies, visit the Te Kāinga website.
Te Kāinga Aroha (197 Willis St) has 52 apartments and opened in March 2021.
Te Kāinga Te Aka (203 Willis St) has 54 apartments and opened in June 2022. Te Aka includes six ground floor apartments with accessible features.
Te Kāinga Te Pu (180 Willis St) has 74 apartments and opened in March 2023.
Find out more about our buildings on the Te Kāinga website.
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Te Kāinga mailing list
Target group
The aim of the Te Kāinga programme is to provide secure, affordable and long-term rental accommodation in Wellington that can be accessed by those on medium to lower incomes and may otherwise find it difficult to access appropriate housing options in the city.
Council resolved to update the criteria on 8 December 2022. This included making certain industries that created the most jobs for the city a priority, as per the Council’s Economic Wellbeing Strategy. These are:
- Public sector
- Public transport
- Hospitality
- Tourism
- Healthcare
- Education and training
In making the above change to the criteria the Council also added the following industries:
- Māori organisations
- The arts
- Start-ups
Priority criteria for apartments
Anyone can apply for a Te Kāinga apartment, applications are prioritised based on the following criteria:
- People on incomes under $95,000 for an individual and $150,000 for a couple or family and who are not eligible for income related rent.
- People who do not own their own home.
- People who work in, or intend to work in:
- Public sector
- Public transport
- Hospitality
- Tourism
- Healthcare
- Education and training
- Māori organisations
- The arts
- Start-ups
Where there is more demand than we have available units, applicants will be selected by ballot.
We will review the criteria over time to ensure the programme continues to meet the needs of the city.
Rents
Rents are set below market rate for the inner city and are assessed against the Wellington Housing Affordability Model to understand what is affordable and for whom.
Wellington Housing Affordability Model (76KB PDF)
Rents will be assessed annually.
Rent increases will be kept to a minimum and only when it is necessary to ensure the programme continues to have no impact on ratepayers. Increases will not be linked to market rent.
This means the apartments remain more affordable than private market rentals over time. This gives our tenants added financial certainty as well as security of tenure.
More information
Visit the Te Kāinga website for more information about Te Kāinga or email us at tekainga@wcc.govt.nz if you have any questions.