Building a Better Way
Affordable housing
I think this is our biggest challenge in this region. The Queenstown Lakes Community housing trust was formed last year and has developed a
shared ownership model where the trust owns up to 40% of a property
The trust defines affordable housing as <35% of income being spent on a mortgage.
A co-operative at Hawea Flat brought 100 acres of bare land which has 10 members each with 10 acres of land which each has the right to sell. Essentially he coop were their own developers which saved many costs which are shared such as initial purchase price, roading, water , electircity connections
Does anyone know of any other shared models like this?
shared ownership model where the trust owns up to 40% of a property
The trust defines affordable housing as <35% of income being spent on a mortgage.
A co-operative at Hawea Flat brought 100 acres of bare land which has 10 members each with 10 acres of land which each has the right to sell. Essentially he coop were their own developers which saved many costs which are shared such as initial purchase price, roading, water , electircity connections
Does anyone know of any other shared models like this?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Christina Newnham on -
I like the idea of a co-operative as the members have a personal interest in doing something sustainable. Also, if you have a community of people, they are more likely to develop the site as a whole in terms of sustainable district/shared services/infrastructure. However, I would prefer to see people doing this with smaller areas of land and looking at higher densities. Your average sub-division plot of 800sqm is more than capable of taking 2 homes of a moderate and affordable size. This may be one for the RMA though.
In terms of the shared ownership scheme, this is a great idea and one that has been around for some time in Europe. However, unlike there, in NZ you have to still have a minimum 20% deposit (it used to, until recently, be 5%). For most families in the area, this is still the main stumbling block and so this scheme fails to address the needs of the community in this expensive region.
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Permalink Reply by Hugh Skinner on -
Put some of this in Comments last month but maybe it should have gone in Replies!!
Agree with Christina re co-operatives and creating communities. This is often lacking in so-called social housing.
However to get debate going can see the possible saving in bulk buying but did these houses use standard designs or each get separate resource consent and build at different times.
On another tack I wonder with Christina if dispersed living on 10 acre plots an affordable way to live.
Certainly if one can grow sufficient food there are savings to be made but the cost of transport and basic services is going to be higher than a more dense development.
Higher densities are much more a feature of European Housing [from where I am writing this note] and I wonder how long the Kiwi concept of a detached house and extensive suburban development can be sustained against the pressure to concentrate, reduce travel, centralise services or even simply minimise building envelopes to reduce cost and decrease heat loss.
Another thought concerns our lightweight construction which although it can be highly insulated and lends itself to prefabrication and portability is lacking in thermal mass to take full advantage of our sunshine hours [in Otago anyway]
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