Police have attended a sudden death at a boarding house in the Auckland suburb of Favona overnight. 

Emergency services were called about 12.15am to the Norfolk Pine Lodge on Tome St in the Auckland suburb of Māngere. 

A photographer at the scene said police could be seen walking up and down an alleyway with torches. They appeared to be looking at blood spots on a resident's door. 

A spokeswoman confirmed police had attended a sudden death last night at the lodge. It would be referred to the Coroner, she said. 

A St John spokesperson said the ambulance service was notified of an incident in Favona at 12.10am. 

Two ambulances were sent to the lodge but they were not required for transportation. The spokesperson referred all further enquiries to police. 

The lodge on Tomes Lane is a few hundred metres from Oceanic Lodge, where a man died in a suspected homicide just two months ago. 

Both lodges are part of a cluster of privately-owned boarding houses on the grounds of the old Māngere Psychopaedic Hospital, which closed in 1994. 

They are typically used as transitional or emergency housing, with one housing advocate describing such lodges as "the worst of the worst". 

"There is a certain cohort that would feel comfortable living in a boarding house. But predominantly, it offers no security, no sense of long-term tenure, and weekends are party time." 

- by Dubby Henry, NZ Herald