What was Tenancy Tribunal case 5342385 about?

The tribunal order states: By declaration, the current residential rent for the premises is $262.50 per

How much money was awarded in case 5342385?

Compensation: Healthy Homes Standard…: $1,500.00 awarded to tenant; Filing Fee: $28.00 awarded to tenant

What type of tenancy dispute was case 5342385?

The primary dispute was Healthy homes.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 5342385?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/12923964-Tribunal_Order.pdf.

What was Tenancy Tribunal case 5342385 about?

The tribunal order states: By declaration, the current residential rent for the premises is $262.50 per

How much money was awarded in case 5342385?

Compensation: Healthy Homes Standard…: $1,500.00 awarded to tenant; Filing Fee: $28.00 awarded to tenant

What type of tenancy dispute was case 5342385?

The primary dispute was Healthy homes.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 5342385?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/12923964-Tribunal_Order.pdf.

185 Union Street, New Brighton, Christchurch 8061 Tenancy Tribunal Case 5342385 — Healthy homes

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 5342385 — net $1,528.00 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Tenant	Reason
Compensation: Healthy Homes Standards	$1,500.00	Healthy Homes Standards
Filing fee reimbursement	$28.00	Filing fee reimbursement
Net award	$1,528.00
Total payable by Landlord to Tenant	$1,528.00

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 5342385 — net $1,528.00 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Tenant	Reason
Compensation: Healthy Homes Standards	$1,500.00	Healthy Homes Standards
Filing fee reimbursement	$28.00	Filing fee reimbursement
Net award	$1,528.00
Total payable by Landlord to Tenant	$1,528.00

Order

By declaration, the current residential rent for the premises is $262.50 per week, payable weekly in advance on a Tuesday.
Chhotu Dayal Bhana and Yashoda Bhana must pay Rangi Harden $1,528.00 immediately, calculated as shown in table below: DescriptionTenant Compensation: Healthy Homes Standards $1,500.00 Filing fee reimbursement $28.00 Total award $1,528.00 Total payable by Landlord to Tenant $1,528.00
The landlord must carry out the following work to the premises, which must be completed by 31 January 2025: a. Complete draught stopping to a blocked-up toilet window, so that it complies with the Heathy Homes draught stopping and moisture ingress standards.
If the landlord fails to comply with Order above, then the tenant may engage a contractor to undertake the work and charge the landlord the costs of this work up to $1,000. These costs may be set off against rent payable.
All other claims are dismissed.

Reasons

Both parties attended the hearing. The Landlord was represented by Counsel, Mr Hodgins. The tenant was represented by Ms Harden. Background
The property in question is a mixed use (commercial and residential) building. It is owned by Mr and Mrs Bhana
Mr & Mrs Bhana entered into a Residential Tenancy Agreement with Mayur Patel in or around September 2020. They entered a Commercial Lease with Mr Patel at the same time for the balance of the property.
Clause 17 of the Further Terms of the Commercial Lease records: “This Lease shall be contemporaneous with the Residential Tenancy Agreement relating to the upstairs residential portion of the premises and there shall be no alienation of this Lease and the Residential Tenancy Agreement”
The Commercial Lease was assigned to Mr Harden by a Deed of Assignment in December 2021.
Mr Harden lives in the residential premises and runs a mini-mart business from the commercial premises.
A range of disputes have arisen. Mr Harden has made an application to this Tribunal alleging breaches of the landlord’s obligations in relation to the dwelling/residential part of the building. Some of the tenant’s complaints, such as rates and insurance, arise from the Commercial Lease terms and are not a matter for this Tribunal. The Claims & Role of the Tribunal
Following a Case Management conference in October, I clarified Mr Harden’s claims as follows: a. Failure to comply with Healthy Homes Standards; b. Failure of Landlord’s repair and maintenance obligations; c. Breach of Landlord’s obligations in respect of smoke alarms; d. Tenancy Agreement not in writing; e. Breach of requirement to maintain proper rent records; f. Landlord provided an ineffective notice of rent increase; g. Landlord provided a false or misleading document in the Tenancy Agreement with Mr Patel.
I also recorded the following general principles:
The Tribunal’s role was summarised in Birch v Otautahi Community Housing Trust [2022] NZTT 4207456 at [8], as follows: “The Tribunal is an adjudicative body. It is not a forum for general complaint. It is not a complaints service. It is not an investigative body. And it does not mediate disputes. It looks to what is set out in an application by a landlord or a tenant; hears evidence and submissions from both parties; and makes a decision that is binding on the parties.”
A party who brings a claim to the Tenancy Tribunal must prove on the balance of probabilities (more likely than not) that their version of events took place. They must prove that the other party has breached its obligations and the loss (or consequence) they have suffered because of that breach. Independent witnesses, corroborating documents and photographs are an important part of discharging this burden of proof.
The issue of evidence at Tenancy Tribunal hearings was considered by the District Court in Kaipo v Clarke & McCarthy (DC) TT233/02. Judge Mather stated: “...[the applicant] needs to be reminded that like anyone who brings an application before a Tribunal or a Court, it is incumbent upon the applicant to provide the evidence necessary to prove the case. If the applicant fails to do that, then their application will be dismissed whether it has merit or not because it is up to the applicant to provide the necessary evidence. It is not up to the other parties and it is certainly not up to the Tribunal to extract evidence.” (emphasis added)
The Tribunal may make orders for compensation and for exemplary damages. See s78 RTA. Compensation is awarded for actual losses arising from a proven breach of the other party’s obligations. Compensation may also be awarded for less tangible effects of established breaches such as loss of enjoyment or amenity of the tenancy. See Tenants v Singh [2022] NZTT 4315225 for the approach to quantifying compensation for “general damages”. The Tribunal may also make Work Orders.
Exemplary damages may be awarded, at the Tribunal’s discretion, where a party establishes that the other has intentionally committed an “unlawful act” as defined by the RTA. See s109 and schedule 1A RTA.
The tenants’ submissions and separate timeline document were prepared with AI assistance. While there is nothing wrong with that there are errors in the submissions. Reference is made to sections of the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 (RTA) that are either not relevant or do not exist (for example section 16B RTA referred to as “misleading/false statements”), or do not relate to the issues claimed. Generally, Ms Harden adopted a ‘scatter gun’ approach that is not especially helpful.
I have endeavoured to work through the submissions as best I can to address the relevant issues. I will not address the irrelevant references, evidence or issues outside the scope of this Tribunal’s jurisdiction.
Throughout the hearing, Ms Harden constantly went off track, referring to the commercial lease/premises and other irrelevant matters. Multiple historic slights and inconveniences were referred to as if to show that the landlord deliberately set about to ignore, blame or otherwise demean her.
The Tribunal is not a forum of general complaint. The way in which the tenants’ claim was presented suggested that every possible complaint was formulated to appear as a landlord breach, when it was not. If Ms Harden felt that she or Mr Harden were made to feel at fault, or that the landlord was retaliatory in their actions, or was hostile or rude, those are subjective feelings.
There is a personality clash between Ms Harden and Counsel for the Landlord; there is nothing the Tribunal can do about that, but it is an impediment to the parties moving forward. Tenancy Agreement & Rent
The tenant claims that the tenancy agreement is not in writing and that the landlord has not kept proper records for rent.
A landlord must ensure the tenancy agreement is in writing, signed and a copy provided to the tenant prior to the tenancy commencing. See section 13 Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
The tenancy agreement is in writing. It was originally between the landlord and Mr Patel. It was transferred to Mr Harden by virtue of the Deed of Assignment of Lease and Clause 17 of the Commercial Lease.
A landlord must keep proper business records showing details of all rent payments and any bond paid by the tenant. See section 30(1) Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
The landlord accepts that there is some confusion regarding payments made by Mr Harden but says that is because Mr Harden’s payments have been erratic, not clearly identified, not always to the correct bank account. I accept that explanation. However, the landlord should complete a thorough reconciliation of the payments and apportion them between the residential and commercial lease. Likewise, full rent should be paid on time, weekly in advance, to the bank account nominated by the landlord.
The tenant’s submission referred to others clause regarding rent payment records, advertising for rent. Those are not relevant.
Mr Harden has not proved that it is more likely than not that the landlord has breached its obligations in relation to the tenancy agreement or rent records or that he would be entitled to relief for any such breach. These claims are dismissed. Landlord Obligations – Repairs, Healthy Homes, Smoke Alarms
Section 45 RTA sets out a landlord’s responsibilities. Included among them are the responsibility to provide the premises in a reasonably clean state; to provide and maintain the premises in a reasonable state of repair (having regard to the age and character of the premises); and to comply with the Healthy Homes Standards (HHS).
Breaching any of these obligations is an unlawful act for which exemplary damages may be awarded up to a maximum of $7,200.00. See section 45(1A) and Schedule 1A Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
Where the Tribunal finds the landlord has failed to comply with any of these obligations, it may make an order for the landlord to carry out the work. See section 78(1)(e) Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
The tenant’s timeline shows that he first raised concerns about the condition of the premises in June 2025. Shortly after this, there was also a call-out in relation to the security system for the commercial part of the premises. Advice from the service company led to concerns about the smoke and fire alarms for the entire building. I did not hear evidence from the service company.
At the hearing, Ms Harden referred to an historic building consent for earthquake repairs and the fire report completed as part of that process, to argue that the premises are non-compliant with the Smoke Alarm regulations under the RTA. That does not necessarily follow.
Further, the landlord provided evidence of the Code Compliance Certificate issued in relation to the Building Consent, meaning that the fire requirements identified in the Building Consent had been achieved.
The tenant also obtained a Healthy Homes assessment report in Augst 2025 (after the alleged security/smoke alarm failure). That report does not refer to smoke alarms but does identify that the residential premises do not comply with Healthy Homes Standards in respect of insulation, draught stopping and moisture ingress.
The tenant then issued a 14-day notice to remedy. The landlord obtained its own Healthy Homes assessment report on 30 September. That report identified the same issues raised in the tenant report. The landlord’s report also noted that the smoke alarms were not compliant in that one had been broken and could not be reattached to its base (so needs to be replaced). That is a different issue to the one raised by the tenants, which alleged that the entire alarm system is somehow defective. There is no record of the broken alarm having been raised with the landlord.
The evidence establishes that the premises did not comply with Healthy Homes Standards. The landlord claims to have been let down by a contractor but there was no evidence of when the contractor was engaged or what they were instructed to do. All remedial work had been done by the hearing, except in relation to a window that has been boarded up. This area was identified as non-complaint in both reports.
I have made a work order in relation to the window. As this relates to Healthy Homes compliance, I have not made a monetary order as an alternative to compliance. See sections 78(2) and 78(2AA) Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
However, if the work is not done by 31 January 2025, the tenant can engage a contractor to undertake the work and charge the landlord the costs of doing so (up to $1,000). See sections 78(2AAB) and 78(2AAC)(b) Residential Tenancies Act 1986.
The tenant provided limit evidence of loss of amenity as a result of the non- compliance with Healthy Homes Standards. I award compensation of $1,500. This includes the cost of obtaining the Healthy Homes report and any increased power they claim to have spent.
For the Tribunal to award exemplary damages, the tenants must prove that the landlord turned their mind to the alleged unlawful act and deliberately set about to commit it – see Birch.
A failure to provide and maintain the premises in a reasonable state of repair and to comply with the HHS are landlord responsibilities which if breached may result in an award of exemplary damages. However, I find no intentional breaches by the landlord of their statutory responsibilities in this case. The application for exemplary damages is dismissed.
The tenant has not established any other breaches of the landlord’s statutory obligations, it follows that any other claims alluded to in the tenant application are dismissed.
As the tenant was partially successful, I have awarded reimbursement of the Tribunal application fee.
As a final note, I wish to record that the tenant has endeavoured to use the Tribunal process to obtain directions or guidance in relation to matters covered by the commercial lease. That is not appropriate. I have deliberately not commented on the tenant’s obligations under that agreement.

Tenancy Tribunal case 5342385 — Healthy homes at 185 Union Street, New Brighton, Christchurch 8061

At a glance

Tenancy Tribunal case 5342385 — Healthy homes at 185 Union Street, New Brighton, Christchurch 8061

At a glance

Award balance

Claims & awards

Dismissed claims

Order

Reasons

Topics & place

Residential Tenancies Act sections

Key findings

Frequently asked questions

Award balance

Claims & awards

Dismissed claims

Order

Reasons

Topics & place

Residential Tenancies Act sections

Key findings

Frequently asked questions