A makeover for a 1970s state house

Students are transforming a former Kāinga Ora state house into a healthy, energy-efficient home with a HomeStar level 7 accreditation

IRHACE will be following the project in the lead-up to its intended completion in December when the home will be auctioned.

Built in the 1970s and once found along Lavinia Crescent in Māngere East, a former state house is being retrofitted by students at One Tree Hill College.

Acquired as part of Kāinga Ora – Homes and Communities’ major redevelopment in the area, the One Tree Hill College Trade Academy, in partnership with Kāinga Ora, has taken on the task of transforming the house into a dwelling with a HomeStar level 7 accreditation – a first for any 1970s state house in New Zealand.

As one of the project’s sponsors, Simx is providing a continuous extraction home ventilation system for the students to install.

“Our plan is to go down and interact with the students when they’re installing the system, provide some advice and explain the basics of ventilation, why it’s important and the role that it has in creating healthy homes,” says Josiah Richardson from Simx.

A continuous ventilation system with automated humidity sensing and boost fan speeds, the Vent-Axia MultiVent from Simx is a new technology ideal for apartments, multi-unit dwellings and freestanding homes to ensure refreshed indoor air quality by extracting pollutants.

“The plan is to extract from the kitchen, the bathroom and the toilet,” says Josiah. “The MultiVent is clever in how it works in that it’s continuously on, but it also has automation so that when it detects high humidity events it boosts the fan. Another benefit is that all three wet rooms exhaust through a single fan in the MultiVent which means there is only an exhaust outlet and fewer penetrations through the building envelope. The plan is to further augment it with some of our passive air inlets. This system of continuous extraction with passive air satisfies the HomeStar 7 rating because fresh air gets drawn in through the air inlets and then extracted through the extraction system.”

As well as being upgraded with a continuous ventilation system, double-glazing will be installed in the home along with the insulation in the roof and under floors replaced to help maintain a stable temperature year-round, minimise running costs and prevent issues like mould.

“This is such a cool project. It’s a win-win for the housing industry because we’re encouraging more young people to keep the industry going, and it’s also a win because not only are we encouraging them to get into the industry but we’re giving them really practical tips on how to build houses better,” says Josiah.

“We hope that this is the way that we can teach the next generation to build better homes and to really improve the living standards of all New Zealanders.” simx.co.nz