Almost 6000 Kiwis register for KiwiBuild

More than 5950 New Zealanders have signed up for KiwiBuild so far - six times the number of houses planned to be built in the next year.

The Government's affordable housing initiative officially opened to the public on Wednesday, and the registrations of interest came flooding in immediately.

By 10am 1000 people had registered, and that number had almost tripled by lunchtime.

Minister for Housing and Urban Development Phil Twyford said at one point the KiwiBuild Unit was receiving 15 registrations per minute.

"They didn't so much as enter, but break the door down," he says of the registrants.

However the Government expects to build just 1000 of a planned 100,000 affordable homes before July 2019, meaning most Kiwis who have signed up for the programme will be waiting a while.

Mr Twyford says the overwhelming public interest in KiwiBuild is predictive of its future success.

"When you take the response from the public who want these houses, the response from the people who know how to build these houses and the response from developers and the manufacturing sector who will deliver these houses, I'm confident that KiwiBuild will be the game changer our residential housing sector needs."

Newshub.