HOUSES AND THE LAW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 16, 19 January 1938, Page 6

HOUSES AND THE LAW.

The legislative web which surrounds the owner of a house who is not also its occupier : seems to become ever more difficult to break through. Yesterday, in the case of a house in Newton, it was shown to the Court that the | owners and the purchasers, who wanted to live in it, had included in their agreement a provision that if vacant possession could not be obtained the agreement was null and void. They found that by making this provision they had debarred themselves from obtaining even that slight degree of help which the Act allows the Court to give to landlords. As it was also stated that the tenants had searched ; for other premises without success, it does not > appear that possession of the house could have been obtained, but the Court's decision must deepen the impression of the extreme difficulty of selling tenanted houses. In the prevailing circumstances, of course, any tenant has a good reason for not wishing to be displaced, but it is also true that there are sometimes equally good and pressing reasons impelling landlords to sell houses. To this fact the Act gives no recognition. One of the consequences of the Act, perhaps unforeseen and certainly undesirable, is that when the owner of a house 9 wishes to sell it, and can obtain vacant possession, he retains it vacant. No solution of the impasse appears, except the overtaking of the shortage hy new building, and that, unfortunately, is a distant and uncertain prospect.