Families carving up land to house grown-up children and grandparents
Date 21 Feb 2022
With ballooning land and property prices, more families are exploring intergenerational subdivision options to provide housing for loved ones.
Whether it is buying a plot of land in the country with enough room for multiple homes, or slicing off the backyard to give to the kids, people seem to be increasingly keen to keep it in the family.
Housing affordability has deteriorated to the worst level on record, with the average property worth 8.8 times the average income at the end of last year, property analyst CoreLogic said in its latest housing affordability report.
Rob Hard of Upper Hutt, has bought just over 4 hectares near Greytown, in Wairarapa, with plans to relocate a home for his family with enough room for a minor dwelling for his father nearby.
He envisaged when his teenage sons got a bit older he could provide the land to give them the option for their own housing developments in the future.
“Because you do want to give your kids a bit of a hand up in life,” he said.
Hard deals in real estate in the Wellington region and said he was also seeing more interest in the market for multiple dwelling properties.
“People often want it all under the same roof with parents coming to live with them, or they want a little granny flat type situation.”
While urban property owners with large enough sections had been carrying out infill subdivisions for some time, real estate agents were noticing many of those were now with family in mind.
South Wairarapa real estate agent Benn Milne said over the last two years he had noticed a trend in property owners subdividing land with multiple lots, often with some provision for family members.
“Parents that own a decent-size section are carving a bit of land off for their kids. It’s certainly not a silver spoon situation, the kids are having to front up with some of the costs for it.”
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