A year after a troubled, half-finished Auckland apartment block found a new owner, neighbouring businesses are still waiting for the building to be finished - or knocked down.

The Epsom Central Apartments Project halted five years ago, after Auckland Council found it had not complied with building consent.The original partnership, Epsom Central Apartments LP, was put into receivership in 2022, and purchased by Xiao Liu, the director of a company named Reeheng Limited, in September 2023.Since then, community members and business owners have said there has been an air of mystery around what will happen to the building, which at one point was filled with rats and squatters.