{"id":583290,"date":"2026-08-28T19:20:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T19:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/583290\/"},"modified":"2026-08-28T19:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T19:20:12","slug":"salmon-farms-solution-to-rental-pressures-manage-our-own","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/583290\/","title":{"rendered":"Salmon farm’s solution to rental pressures: ‘Manage our own’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Twizel salmon farm is tackling the district\u2019s housing shortage head-on by securing rental accommodation for its growing workforce.<\/p>\n

By Claire Taylor for Local Democracy Reporting<\/a><\/p>\n

Twizel’s High Country Salmon, established by Margaret and Richard Logan in 2000, has grown from a small fish farm into a major tourism operation with a restaurant, gift shop and tours.<\/p>\n

The company now employs more than 60 staff across its operations, serving between 1000 and 4000 visitors a day.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe represent a huge number of different countries and cultures and some of those are long term visa holders and residents, and some of them are … on their working holiday,\u201d the company\u2019s managing director Jeni Logan said.<\/p>\n

Logan said they also provided housing for its workers, currently managing seven rental properties and were on the hunt for more.<\/p>\n

‘If we haven’t got houses… they can’t come’<\/p>\n

She said Twizel, as a growing town, did not have a large pool of workers to meet the business\u2019s needs so they relied on bringing people into the district and housing them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we haven\u2019t got the houses \u2026 they can\u2019t come,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur business is really limited if we don\u2019t have houses so we\u2019ve been managing our own houses directly with landlords for a number of years,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The Mackenzie District Council has been focused on resolving the lack of worker accommodation in the district this year, with the council reporting struggles to recruit staff in March due to the lack of housing.<\/p>\n

In May, councillors agreed to the sale of a Tekapo lot with strict legal guidelines that it be developed for worker accommodation.<\/p>\n

Logan said Twizel had plenty of houses, but not enough were being rented out<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More property owners were recognising the benefits of renting to a single company rather than relying on short-term rentals, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey get their rent paid on time, in full every week \u2026 we do the quarterly inspections, we do any maintenance that needs to be done, liaise with any contractors.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt makes it really easy for the landlord,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Logan said she had also received feedback that landlords valued the financial security of longer-term rentals.<\/p>\n

\u201cBanks don\u2019t recognise the income from Airbnb as being steady income \u2026 banks prefer just that signed contract lease if you\u2019re using that house as security or that income as security,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

‘Need to be affordable for us and our staff’<\/p>\n

Some Twizel property owners who rented homes to High Country Salmon had since offered the company other rental properties, she said, with all tenancy agreements to date renewed.<\/p>\n

Logan said the biggest challenge was securing rental properties.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to get them at a reasonable price so they\u2019re affordable for us and affordable for our staff so we really need to sell the benefits of renting to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c[For] people that are out of town, it\u2019s great because we do all the quarterly inspections and send them the report \u2026 they don\u2019t have to worry.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"While<\/p>\n

While the salmon farm operated year-round, staff numbers dropped during winter. (Source: Getty)<\/p>\n

While the salmon farm operated year-round, staff numbers dropped during winter. However, the company continued paying for the rooms and maintaining the rentals until they were needed again, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take the hit if the rooms aren\u2019t full and we know that\u2019s an investment that we make over winter \u2026 because we know we\u2019re going to need those rooms in summer.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said the arrangement was also a major benefit for staff, many of whom were tourists or travellers who shared similar experiences.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re flatting with their workmates \u2026 it\u2019s a really good way to instantly meet people, learn about what\u2019s going on in the town, have people to share with on your days off,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She said it was common now for Twizel businesses to rent properties directly from landlords to house their workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think any business in Twizel that is dependent on staff has to be looking down these routes \u2026 It can be a problem solved by the community because the houses are there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ on Air<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Twizel salmon farm is tackling the district\u2019s housing shortage head-on by securing rental accommodation for its growing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":583291,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[687,111,43,139,69,35933],"class_list":["post-583290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-housing-and-infrastructure","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-work-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=583290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/583291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=583290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=583290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=583290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}