– New Zealand’s first passive house sold for $4.215 million at auction in Auckland’s Glendowie.
– The energy-efficient home, built 13 years ago, boasts one of the country’s lowest power bills.
– The vendor, a Canadian engineer, built it to combat cold, damp conditions in local homes.
New Zealand’s first passive house has sold under the hammer today for $4.215 million.
Bidding on the four-bedroom home on Kesteven Avenue, in Auckland’s Glendowie, kicked off $3.3m – just under its RV of $3.58m – and quickly reached $4m, before the Barfoot & Thompson auction was paused for negotiations.
The property came to the floor five minutes later, and the auction roared back into action, with 20 more bids made before the hammer came down.
The Passive House standards keep the home warm and dry at minimum cost. Photo / Supplied
While they look beautiful, the German double- and triple-glazed windows keep temperatures inside even. Photo / Supplied
The house boasts one of the country’s lowest power bills, thanks to the energy-efficient systems that run through it, and was on the market for the first time since it was built 13 years ago
It was the first home in Australasia to adopt the Passivhaus (Passive House) standard, which has brought about buildings with little or no heating requirements.
Barfoot & Thompson listing agent Jonathan Viljoen told OneRoof ahead of the auction that the house had sparked a lot of buyer excitement. “They can feel the atmosphere as soon as they walk in. The temperature is 20 degrees, winter or summer. It’s not something you come across every day,” he said. “I have had one buyer saying, ‘This is perfect.’”
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The vendor, an engineer from Canada, told OneRoof he had found New Zealand homes to be cold and damp, so he decided to build something better from scratch.
However, creating a home to Passive House standards wasn’t an easy task. Luckily, he was able to get help from one of the few Kiwis who knew about the building techniques, Queenstown building science engineer Denise Martin. She assisted with the calculations needed to ensure the house met the strict global standards. He also had help from Auckland Council’s then head of design, Ludo Campbell-Reid, who walked planners through the consents.
“There were no materials in New Zealand, there was no knowledge in New Zealand,” the vendor said. “At that point [in 2011], the council was very worried about leaky buildings. Someone in council said to me, ‘Our air is different from the air in Europe, so it won’t work here.’
“Ludo was doing a lot of innovative work here, and he helped get people to listen. He had other people from the university backing up the data.”
The house is packed with luxury finishes and features. Photo / Supplied
Before submitting final plans for building approval, the vendor estimated he had dozens of meetings with council officers over the space of six months. “It was like, ‘No, we don’t do those here.’ They were just doing their job. People were nervous. No one was rude, but they got sick of seeing me,” he said.
“Then once we built it, other people used our building consents as a basis for their applications, so it became easier.”
Builder Chris Foley was key to the project’s success, the vendor said.
“He’s become a dear friend. He did not think I was too crazy. He did not fully know what he was getting involved with, but he did this when everything we did was brand new.
Foley reported that the house won the overall house award at the 2015 South Pacific Passive House Awards and the single-family home category at the 2014 International Passive House Awards.
While buyers can easily see the appeal of many of the finishes – the German windows, the fireplace, the bamboo floors – the beauty of the property was its ability to provide low-cost, sustainable living.
“Our utility bill is less than $120 a month, and that’s because we charge two electric cars and run a dryer. We collect our own water to run the laundry and toilet.
“We chose to build at a very high standard. We budgeted so we could do this. Building this today would cost a whole lot more,” he said.
The vendor told OneRoof he and his partner were selling up for something smaller, but no less special. “Once you’ve lived in this environment, you’re not going to buy an ordinary house.”
He added: “The house is so comfortable. Our kids run around every winter in shorts and T-shirts. They hated going to sleepovers because it was too cold and too hot.”