Nelson is to gain six new affordable rental houses in Victory.

The Nelson City Council sold the two Totara St properties at the land valuation of $715,000 to the Nelson Tasman Housing Trust (NTHT), a registered community housing provider.

“We’re very pleased and very excited about being able to provide good housing outcomes for people in need of housing and intensifying in a good location in Victory,” said NTHT director Carrie Mozena.

The council bought the properties in the 1990s as a potential site for the relocation of Victory Kindergarten in the event of the Southern Link progressing.

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However, after the endorsement of the Nelson Future Access business case last year the properties were no longer needed.

The housing trust are in the process of applying for Ministry of Housing and Urban Development funding to develop the land into six houses.

Mozena said all going well, they expected the houses would be completed in 2024.

The selection process for tenants was expected to be within three to six months of a completion date, and all of the residents would be selected from the Public Housing Register, Mozena said.

The homes were designed as family homes, so they would be accommodating “households with children”.

“We’ll be looking at applications and interviewing multiple people who are seeking to live there and then making selections based on a combination of factors, which include housing need suitability for that area, [the] ability of people to get along well with their neighbours, ability to be reliable tenants, and [be] positive community members.

“We make all those assessments quite carefully.”

Rentals are to be set at income related rates, equating to 25% of a family’s total income. The houses will be a variety of two, three and four bedroom homes.

Nelson deputy mayor and urban development subcommittee chair Judene Edgar said Nelsonians lived in “one of the least affordable regions in the country for housing, with wages less than the national average”.

“We know that families are living in emergency housing, older people are sleeping in cars and that the public housing waiting list is growing, so there is a critical need for more affordable housing.”

Mozena said the houses would be long term rentals designed to give housing security, meaning families would not have to worry about moving schools or “increased transport issues due to an unplanned move”.

The current dwellings on the site were “old and in poor condition”. Mozena said one was likely to be deconstructed and materials would be recycled. The other may be relocated. The council said the current tenants had been kept informed throughout the process, which began in November 2021.