National is promising to build more state houses if elected in October.
Leader Judith Collins told TVNZ1's Breakfast this morning a policy announcement would be coming soon.
And while she wouldn't give specific numbers until a policy announcement, when asked by host John Campbell if it means National would build state houses in meaningful numbers, Collins said "absolutely".
"We can't have people living in motels for the rest of their lives as we've seen.
"When you see the state house wait list go from 5000 people, as it was when we were in Government and left Government [in 2017], to 18,000 now, that tells me we actually need more private rentals as well as the state houses."
Collins said she was "embarrassed" at the 5000 figure, but said it was "not National's fault" it has now more than tripled.
"We've got nothing from the current Government on that, so I think we could have done a bit better but I tell you what, it's better than KiwiBuild, it's better than the false promises, it's better than $2 billion wasted, it's better than empty houses left in Wanaka."
However, Collins did admit the last National government was "too slow to act on it".
"I think we could have done better in that with more housing being built, I've got no problem saying that.
"I think we do need to have more state housing, community housing, we call it social housing."
She also wouldn't say when a detailed policy announcement was expected.
"We will build more state houses but also within the communities, so we're still putting out our policy on that, but I can tell you that we also believe in community providers of housing," she said.
"When other parties talk about National selling state houses, a lot of those houses were sold to community housing providers. We’ve got no problem with community housing providers."
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