Are you buying a house in NZ?

Have you considered the cost of building a new home?

Here’s some food for thought before you commit to a mortgage!

We moisture test homes all over NZ, and one of the most common questions we get from clients, is “If this home was built to the old ‘leak building’ code, could it cause us leaking problems into the future, even if it’s not leaking now?”. The short answer is “yes” in many cases if the house isn’t maintained correctly (especially houses with ‘leaky building’ design issues).

More and more, clients are now starting to realise that it may work out better to buy a section and build! So rather than agonise over buying a potential ‘time bomb’ that may either be leaking now, or turn into a leaky home down the track… why not build a fresh new house! Benefits:

• Brand new… choose your colours
• Treated timber will be used in the external walls
• It will be constructed with a cavity system
• 10 year master builders warranty in most cases
• You can build a solid brick and tile that has proven to withstand the test of time (Unlike some plaster systems)
• Not a leaky home!

Today I was doing a leaky building test for a client looking to purchase a home in Albany on the North Shore. The house was $670,000 to buy… and the plaster system was making the buyer very nervous. This house was 180sqm. Now, lets look at some numbers to compare building v’s buying an existing dwelling that could already be leaking…

If you can buy a section in your desired area (or nearby) in a residential area that already has water and power running to the front gate, for about $300,000… then in the case of the example above, the buyer still has $370,000 left over to build the house. If they can get the house built for $2000sqm (at the time of writing, this figure is above the average build cost according to the department of building and housing), then they end up spending the same amount of money as the plaster home they were about to purchase, except this time they get a brand new home the same size… stress free!

The point of writing this article, is to remind you to ‘run the numbers’ on building a new home as part of your research in the area. If there is no available land left around the particular area you desire to live, then you don’t have an option to build new… but wouldn’t you prefer to move 1omins down the road and have the peace of mind a new home would bring you?

If you have your eye on an existing home… get a thermal imaging moisture test first!