The neighbours are getting closer
Quarter-acre dream going rural as intensification snips section sizes
New Zealand’s housing dream is getting smaller by the day in the country’s biggest cities.
Research by OneRoof and its data partner Valocity shows Manukau is the toughest place in Auckland to land a home with a big backyard. Just 9.7 per cent of properties in the rating authority sit on 1012sq m or more, compared with 15 per cent for Greater Auckland.
Nationally, Wellington has the lowest share of quarter acre sections, with fewer than 3000 homes in the capital, or 7.3 per cent of total housing stock, meeting the quarter-acre threshold.
Just as squeezed are Tauranga and neighbouring Kawerau, where 7.5 per cent of homes occupy sections greater than 1012sq m. Hamilton and Christchurch also score lowly.
Dunedin was the city with the highest percentage of homes with big backyards: 18 per cent of its housing stock on 1012sqm or more.
OneRoof editor Owen Vaughan said the reason Auckland had a higher percentage of quarter-acre sections than Wellington or Tauranga was the number of residential properties in the rural fringes.
“More than a quarter of homes in Franklin and Rodney are on 1012sq m-plus sections.
“Manukau’s share is so low due to the increase in intensification over the past 10 years. The median property size in the area is now 418sq m, well below national median of 709sq m.”
Vaughan said homes with large sections in New Zealand’s big cities were also typically expensive.
“A large section in Remuera could set you back more than $2 million easily.”
Smaller towns and rural locations, where prices were more affordable, had the highest percentage of large sections. The research showed New Zealand’s quarter acre capital is the Far North, where 56 per cent of the region’s 14,763 houses occupy 1012sq m or more and the median house value is $415,000.
Following close behind are Waimate and Southland, in the South Island, where more than 55 per cent of homes fit the bill — and the median values are $237,500 and $295,000 respectively.
The region with the highest proportion of quarter-acre sections and most affordable homes was Rangitikei, where the median value is $200,000.
OneRoof found the New Zealand city with the smallest median section size, at 599sq m, was Wellington. Hamilton had the largest, at 690sq m. Auckland’s median section size sat at 647sq m, Tauranga’s 620sq m, Christchurch’s 653sq m and Dunedin’s 666sq m.
The research also found that the size of Kiwi sections varied by dwelling age, with houses built pre-1910 on the smallest sections.
Valocity valuation director James Wilson said older houses such as worker cottages and early housing were packed close together in many inner city suburbs.
The average land size for homes built during the 1950s was 812sq m but plot sizes have steadily decreased since then, and houses built this decade sit on average sections of 624sq m.
The tiniest plots in older parts of Wellington and the Hutt Valley (under 400sq m for some), reflect the geography and location of early housing in the area. Even for houses built today, plot sizes for the region hover around the 500sq m mark, on par with Auckland and Tauranga.
But that doesn’t stop home buyers from dreaming. A recent study of home owners and would-be buyers, commissioned by Westpac, found that nearly half (49 per cent) thought a backyard was essential.
However, city dwellers were more realistic about their backyard prospects — just 39 per cent of Aucklanders and 43 per cent of Wellingtonians said it was essential.
That has changed from five years ago, when a survey by Mitre 10 found that 84 per cent of Kiwis still loved the idea of a traditional quarter-acre paradise, even though more than half reckoned the space they had now was smaller than what they’d grown up with.