Tauranga student speaks out about shock after landlord asked, 'Are you Māori?'

"Just reading your name, are you Māori?" the landlord asked Reremai Cameron.

A Tauranga woman who was asked "are you Māori?" after inquiring about a rental property has spoken on camera for the first time.

Reremai Cameron, a student studying social work, says she feels "disappointed" following what she calls "discrimination".

The landlord, who we've chosen not to name, asked a number of questions as outlined below:

"Just reading your name, are you Māori?"

"If so, I hope you are aware that rent would only cover you and no friends or family members to stay in the sleep out."

"We have had a Māori in our home before whom had multiple family and friend visitors, that is something that we will not tolerate." 

The landlord also stated to Ms Cameron that she would need to "buy her own food" and milk and coffee would not be provided.

Ms Cameron told 1 NEWS she was left feeling "shocked".

"That anyone would base that on my name - like, I've had discrimination at face value but never just because of my name," she said.

Dan Lusby from Tauranga Rentals says the city's rental market is at a "crisis" point, but this line of questioning is unnecessary.

"We see some of our landlords being discriminating, I'd like to call it," he says.

The Human Rights Commission says in the last five years it’s received nearly 400 complaints from tenants relating to discrimination by landlords or property managers.

And it says human rights law and tenancy law "make it unlawful for landlords to treat anyone differently on certain grounds”.

1 NEWS has approached the landlord for comment.

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