Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Hi everyone
So, we have been here for just over a week. Most things are going well and the girls loved the zoo! However, there are surprisingly few rental places available. I feel like I am spending all my time looking for somewhere, our search area is pretty wide but there is hardly anything out there and what we have seen is pretty grotty. We can afford to spend $850/ week but there is just nothing in that price range (it is either cheaper and therefore grotty or miles away from nursery and work, etc) or budget busting (eg $1200). Apart from trade me, are there any tips?
Then, to top off a bad day house hunting, PSS have said that our stuff will. Only arrive on the 11th Nov and will take a further 2 weeks to clear customs, etc. we had sole use of a 40ft container and our house was packed up on 30th Aug. It will therefore take 12 weeks, very different from the 6-8 weeks estimated? Is this normal and, if not, can I do anything about it?!
I know it is just settling in issues but it is stressful! On the up side, we have had lots of good experiences so far and I am looking forward to starting work on Monday....
:)

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

sorry to hear of your rental problems. sorry can't help much apart from looking on google for rental agencies in your area and/or look on http://www.nz.open2view.com/rental

as for PSS we used them and the shipping dates as far as we were informed was just for the shipping over the sea, 8-10wks then you need to add on custom times and that depends on how much work custom has on but I must say they were quite quick with our container, only a week, the car well that was a different story and took over 2 weeks to get it from the vehicle in inspection and it was a mess when they had finished with it :frown:

are you tracking your container ship?

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Thanks for your quick reply, I hadn't seen that website before so will check it out. Sorry if it is a stupid question but how do I track the container/ship?!

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

what areas are you looking for rentals.
I rent a beautiful restored, central heated 3 bed villa in Devonport for Waaaaay less than $850 a week.
From my front door to the city is 20 minutes which includes the 5 minute walk to the ferry
Decile ten schools all around me and you could take your pick of half a dozen nurseries.
Of course I understand it may not be a suitable area for you but I also have friends in
St Heliers in a $2m house that also costs less than $850 a week

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

You should have a container reference and container line on your docs somewhere, else the ships name?

Then search on the line name and "tracking" (bit like tracking a giant parcel), or put the ships name into here and you can track the ship in near-real-time (except if out of range or in areas of known piracy around East Africa/Somalia etc).

Our container took 9 weeks door to door but most will trans-ship at some point in the journey, any delays can mean missing a slick connection and being delayed a tad to pick up the next one...

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

where is work and how far is far we have just rented a beautiful place that will take our dog (which is rare for $650) in Torbay it takes me 30 mins max either way still less than the commute I had in UK
We had the same with PSS basically they do not know also the we found the ship seemed to go to a lot more ports and was delayed a week in Sydney before going to Aucllkand and then Wellington 2weeks in customs sounds extreme though as the port want to get rid asap

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Our container ship company actually had a website and we could track our container through them, was a bit annoying as it docked at Auckland and we thought great next few days but then sailed on through to Christchurch before coming back to Wellington. Do you know who is shipping yours?
Ours was Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC)

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Hi Jane,

Congratulations on selling the house. When do you hope to leave?
Carole

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Sorry about the PiSS taking delay. We used PSS and they were ok. We tracked our container online because we found out the name of the container ship, Googled it and tracked it's voyage across the world !

We had an MSC container just like Mrs Fychan but PSS was our agent.

Auckland rental market :frown: We tried for a fruitless couple of weeks last March to get a rental. I felt that agents and private landlords were not taking me seriously. I couldn't help but wonder if they heard my English accent and thought I was just a glorified holiday maker.

We didn't have a car at the time either so that made it damn near impossible to view any rentals. I asked where the bus stop was on an e-mail to one landlord and was just advised to look up the local bus timetable.:banghead:

My husband's sister and family have just moved into a rental near the East Coast Bays Road in Auckland. It's a four bedroom split level property, it's costing them $650 per week. They are a family of five. Good luck with your search.

Oh Auckland does my head in, we bailed out to Christchurch, then bailed on Christchurch within three months to where we are now in New Zealand.

By the way there's a company called, 'Mr. Rental' they will rent you all the furniture you could possibly need as well as white goods on a short term basis prior to your furniture coming. DTR is another rental company, don't know if they are in Auckland. Having said that you will still have to get by on the clothes you bought with you. You might have to eat with plastic knives and forks plus other, 'camping style' make do's. In the interim. Would you consider renting a camper van as it would already be fully equiped ? Just an idea. We were in b&b's or Motels to fill in the gaps between rentals. Not a cheap option I know, especially as you are a family.

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

Sent you a PM....

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

PSS gave us the same time frame but did mention that there would possibly be add-on's for customs etc; we looked at several companies and the concensus was approx 12 weeks for a sole use container with checks. Good luck with the house hunt, I'm dreading that bit when we land in Nov!

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

I thought ours was pretty quick, 9 weeks dead door-to-door, including 1 week for NZ MAF/Customs and 3 days in Felixstowe waiting for the ship.

Its partly luck of the draw on scheduling and whether any connections are made/missed. No excuse for not tracking these days, just ask you shippers for the container ref, MSC do a pretty good tracking website with email alerts whenever it arrives/leaves/tranships etc....

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

I find this quite an interesting point of view re the rentals. It is very different over here to the UK in renting somewhere. there's less availability of good quality housing so its more open home, view when the agent wants you to view and apply and then they take their pick.

Not sure why the agent and landlord wouldn't be taking you seriously though - that's an interesting view you have. I wonder what you were saying when you said you wanted to view the property.

I'd say that not having a car would have been a problem and it doesn't surprise me that you didn't have much help with people telling you about the bus stops - no one knows anything about public transport and bus routes in auckland really!

There are plenty of rental companies - I looked at Mr Rental's website for a washing machine......i've ended up going to a local company on Dominion Road and i'm paying $35 a month for it instead of $44 through Mr Rental - and i would have been paying more than that if i wanted a short term rental.

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

I normally phoned the person who was advertising their place to rent either private or commercial landlord and said, 'I'm phoning about the property for rent, is it still available, when could we come and view it ?'. I usually left an answering machine message which was rarely replied to. Some private landlords seemed to think they were doing their prospective tennants some sort of personal favour by allowing them to pay rent to live in their property.

Yeah, no car, no job, no home - it wasn't looking good. No real prospect of getting any of those things either despite our best efforts.

Anyway, no loss. As I've said before, Auckland does my head in and we're better off out of it. As far as I'm concerned happiness is Auckland in my rear view mirror.

I've got the rental of our Mr Rental washing machine down to $20 per fortnight, oh, that's $40 per month isn't it ? Oh well, it's an improvement on $22 dollars per fortnight that we were paying for it last year when it was brand new.

Re: Rant - PSS delays and auckland rental market!
 

fair enough. i had non-returned phone calls. i put it down to them having plenty of applicants already and just not bothering. didn't think anything of it being my english accent. maybe i'm wrong!

I will admit - my washing machine is definitely not all new and spangly! still - gets my clothes clean! :thumbsup: