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Speaker 1: Ray and Bridge, which big day. If you're a Wellington

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Speaker 1: rate payer, qv have released the new rating valuations. This

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Speaker 1: is where they officially work out how much your house

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Speaker 1: is worth for the purpose of setting rates. And if

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Speaker 1: you've been following the property market, it might't be a

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Speaker 1: shock to you that the average Wellington property is worth

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Speaker 1: twenty four point four percent less than it was when

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Speaker 1: the last set of evaluations were released in twenty twenty one.

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Speaker 1: It's about twenty one percent for commercial. Ben McNulty is

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Speaker 1: a Wellington City councilor.

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Speaker 2: He's with me, Hi, Ben, afternoon, Ryan, thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: Does this mean cheaper rates?

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Speaker 2: Unfortunately, it doesn't. I'd like to say that it's positive news,

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Speaker 2: but it really doesn't mean much. And that's because the

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Speaker 2: Council's decided it needs thirteen percent more money from ratepayers

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Speaker 2: to run the city for next year, which means rates

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Speaker 2: have to go up to meet that amount. So really

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Speaker 2: all valuations do is they just shuffle around the balance

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Speaker 2: for each suburb pays towards that pie.

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Speaker 1: So okay, all right, but so you you have your

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Speaker 1: your number, right that QV number, so that's come down

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Speaker 1: and then surely then your rates would come down and

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Speaker 1: you would have to separately declare that you want to

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Speaker 1: increase it is that not how it works, not really.

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Speaker 2: So let's say the city's operating budget last year six

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Speaker 2: hundred million dollars. This year we're saying we need six

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Speaker 2: hundred and sixty million dollars. I'm not arguing that's wrong

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Speaker 2: or right, just that's the facts laid out. We have

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Speaker 2: to find sixty million dollars more than we did last year.

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Speaker 2: So really, all it means is that if city on

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Speaker 2: an average, in the city, the rates, sorry, the values

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Speaker 2: went down twenty four percent. So if your house value

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Speaker 2: went down thirty percent, well that's good news because you'll

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Speaker 2: have a slightly smaller rates increased than if your house

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Speaker 2: went only down twenty percent. But it all, it's quite complicated,

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Speaker 2: but it all just depends how much did your property

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Speaker 2: decrease versuy average in Wellington, and there's really only two suburbs,

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Speaker 2: Northland and Strathmore Park. They'll have increases at the lowest

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Speaker 2: in the city and actually the rural areas like Market

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Speaker 2: and Ahadi you are going to see the largest spikes.

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Speaker 2: For everyone else, it's going to be unfortunately, you know,

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Speaker 2: somewhere in the realm of four to fifteen percent rates increases.

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Speaker 1: So not only have you just lost because for many

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Speaker 1: people their houses their only real asset, right, not only

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Speaker 1: have you just potentially lost a quarter of your wealth,

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Speaker 1: you're also going to keep paying fifteen percent more in rates.

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Speaker 2: That's the unfortunate reality of living in Wellington. Yeah, I

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Speaker 2: mean last year of councilor Calvert and I with different

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Speaker 2: sides of the spectrum, right, but we try to bring

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Speaker 2: an amendment to the table saying let's just have an

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Speaker 2: option of a ten percent rates increase. What would it

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Speaker 2: take to get there? So just to review And the

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Speaker 2: council voted that down comprehensively twelve votes to six. So

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Speaker 2: that council as a majority are not interested in looking

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Speaker 2: at are their options for lower rates on the table.

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Speaker 2: They've just accepted these are the rates increases and Wellingtonians

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Speaker 2: will have to get grin and.

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Speaker 1: Barrett, they're still getting their bike a golden mile thing.

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Speaker 2: They're still getting their golden mile and.

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Speaker 1: Oh oh they'll be happy about that. So you're you're

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Speaker 1: twenty five percent poorer, rates are going up fifteen percent,

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Speaker 1: but you can bike down Lampton Key, thank you, Ben,

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Speaker 1: Ben McNulty Runnings and City councilor with us this evening

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Speaker 2: For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to

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