Racist Post On 'Foreign' Landlords In NZ Raises Hell On Reddit

A Reddit post blaming “foreigners from poorer countries” spoiling the quality of life in New Zealand is being called out for race baiting.   

A user with the name LobsterAgile415 posted the message titled ‘The effect of foreign landlords’ on Reddit on April 10, 2024, calling on the government to “put restrictions and measurements” around foreign investment into property, “specifically when the landlords are foreign and from a non-English speaking community.

“Firstly I was going to highlight a specific ethnicity who has a lot of property investment, however it's not those of that ethnicity that are the problem,” the post read.

“It's those that don't live here and are from countries where people have less rights and they feel entitled to exercise those rights here like they're in a country where they can't be held accountable for it.”

The user goes on to say they are currently living as a tenant with a foreign landlord, who walked into their room to wake them up to make her do gardening. 

“They've also just dropped their child off in the house for the day without asking (yes I've called tenancy services). I just don't think the government really has an eye on what introducing a foreign perspective which has a lot of day to day power over the lives of those who rent, has done to renters. 

“I'm just concerned that foreigners from poorer countries are coming here to get a better life, but actually in the process are pulling the quality of NZ life down to a level we're not used to living in.”

Some users were quick to call out the post for race-baiting. “Lol race bait post,” posted one user. “Ethnicity, race and nationality do not define if you're a c4n#!. A c4n# can be foreign, a c4n# can be local, a c4n# can be an "apostle" ac4n# can be a politician. Trying to overlay it with race, nationality or ethnicity is a c4n# thing to do.”

Another user questioned if calling the landlord a foreigner was correct in the first place. “Who cares what ethnicity their landlord is? It also doesn't sound like they're foreigners either. It sounds like they reside permanently in NZ.”

TurkDangerCat didn’t see the post as racist though, and in fact agreed with the sentiment . “Yeah, I try not to rent places with overseas landlords. Too much risk they don’t know the rules and they have zero commitment to the country. You are just there to pad the numbers till they can reap those sweet free capital gains.”