Former tenant of MUSA flats fights for more support
Non-students hike up electricity prices in student association-owned accommodation, leaving students feeling stuck
A former tenant of a MUSA-run flat in Palmerston North says that the flats do not feel like an environment made for students and that MUSA support for students in the flats is lacking.
Food technology student Milli was a tenant of a MUSA flat with one other student and two young professionals last year. She says that after returning from lockdown last year, tensions began to rise in the flat over how rising utility costs would be shared.
“They wanted us to pay more towards power because they were using more. For example, one of the professionals would go and have really long hot showers, and the other one in the winter would have her heater on full, I’d go in, and it’d be a bloody sauna and they’d be in their singlets. And here I was, barely using my heater and having under five-minute showers. In the flat meeting they said ‘we want to put the price up’, I was like ‘I’m not keen on that, I’m doing my part, if you want to use more power, you guys pay more for it’. They said I can leave if I have an issue. It got pretty hostile; they were pretty much verbally abusing me at one point. One of the chicks got their mum on the phone and they were talking about how they can get me kicked out,” she said.
Felling stressed from her university work and flat situation, she contacted the property manager and MUSA asking for advice and putting forward her issues with professionals being able to live in student accommodation.
“My main thing was with professionals in the flats. I wrote in my email ‘I feel part of the reason for this is due to professionals residing in the MUSA properties with more expendable income which some of us student really just do not have’”
“I contacted MUSA and said, ‘I’m not feeling comfortable living here’ and asked what should I do? I don’t have money to pay for two rents, I don’t know if I’ll find another place. MUSA came back and pretty much said ‘sorry to hear that’ but they didn’t really try. I got a three-sentence reply, when I sent a massive email, so I was quite annoyed that happened. They said all I could do was apply for $500 assistance.”
The MUSA advocates initial reply read “As signatories to the tenancy agreement, each tenant has equal responsibility for payment of the rent. If any individual tenant leaves a tenancy, 21 days’ notice is required, and the entire tenancy comes to an end for all parties in the tenancy agreement. All other disagreements are for you to work out as flatmates and are not under MUSA jurisdiction.”
“I was like ‘what the fuck’. This is not how you should be replying to a student,” Milli said.
Milli also found concerning to see that her flat mates’ tenancies could be put in jeopardy too if she decided to leave. Despite their conflict, she was unwilling to potentially ruin her fellow tenants living situation. MUSA General Manager Craig Black believes this would be unlikely to occur, but Milli says the property manager said it could happen too.
“It's not safe for a student coming in, because you might get abused by professionals who have money, and on the other hand you’re also not safe because anyone at any point can end the agreement. These MUSA flats are nice, but they should be just for the students.”
In Black’s second reply to Milli, he says, “I understand your point of view regarding non-student tenants, this aligns with MUSA’s general stance. There are times when students leave MUSA properties, and the remaining student tenants are not able to find student replacements, so a non-student tenant exists. In MUSA’s engagement with Ray White as the property managers, we have agreed that where possible, tenants should be students. Any existing tenancies are protected by tenancy agreements and cannot be dissolved unlawfully by MUSA.”
Milli and her friend who also resided in a MUSA flat with professionals both wrote complaints to MUSA and spoke at the most recent general meeting after being invited to by the current MUSA President Fatima Imran when she heard their concerns.
According to MUSA, 85% of the tenants in flats they run consist of students, but Milli says she knows of more than one MUSA flat that is entirely occupied by non-students and have been for multiple years.
“I know for a fact that there are whole MUSA flats of professionals. I’ve got mates who I have flatted with who have never been students and they’re all in there and they’ve been there for years. There is another one on McGiffert. All professionals, and they’ve been there for two years as well. They are MUSA flats, why isn’t there some sort of check to make sure that students are getting in? I know for a fact that Sam the property manager had a list of students that wanted to get into MUSA flats. But he wouldn’t even get notified if a person was coming in. No one was getting notified. I think there is miscommunication between everyone.”
Milli believes that the demand is there to support a system where only students are allowed into MUSA flats as tenants.
“Ideally, there should be a system where only students are getting in, either you have to give your ID number or whatever. I would love to go back to a MUSA flat if it wasn’t for the what I have been through. It’s really hard to get a flat in Palmy now, prices have gone up on average.”
She says that another reason the flats should be for only for students is because they are funded in part by student levies.
“Who is paying for them? Students are paying for them. Anything that gets broken gets fixed using student money, so why are non-students in there? It just doesn’t make sense at all.”
She is hopeful the current MUSA Exec can work towards making meaningful changes
“At the moment they contract Ray White to do the property managing, but they are thinking maybe they will hire someone from MUSA to do it so it’s more controlled and they’re going to think of a system where it is mainly students occupying the flats.”
Fatima says that she will be doing something to address student concerns with MUSA flats this year.
“I am at the stage where I am researching and understanding what the flats are and how they operate. Once MUSA has done that, MUSA will take appropriate action to help relieve this issue,” she says.