Queenstown’s massive Gibbston Valley Resort is now offering fixed-price house-and-land packages to give more certainty to prospective buyers.
They’re in the first residential enclave, The Reserve, overlooking a nine-hole golf course designed by former golf pro Greg Turner.
Spread over 47 hectares, it comprises 33 north-facing sections, each between 1500 and 2600 square metres, along two rows.
About 20 of the sections have sold so far, and two houses are already springing up.
The resort’s developers are now starting to release their first house-and-land packages.
The first, ‘Bendigo’, is a two-level, three-ensuited-bedroom house on a 2261sqm section, priced at $3.85 million, including GST.
Like all the designs they’re offering buyers, it’s by award-winning Wānaka architects, Condon Scott.
Resort co-developer Greg Hunt says he’s hoping at least five such packages will be out in the marketplace within two months.
He stresses sections can still be bought, for about $1.2m a pop, ‘‘but in these economic times, we’re recognising people need certainty in regard to what their end cost will be’’.
‘‘The key thing is people are hesitant, and we’re taking the stress out for them.
‘‘We obviously want construction underway, and we’re willing to do this because we have confidence in our product and in our team.’’
First off the block: Gibbston Valley Resort’s first home-and-section for sale
Hunt points out buyers get not only a finished house but also amenities like their own clubhouse right beside The Reserve, including a pool, spa, gym, fire pit and barbecue facilities.
Both the golf course and clubhouse are under way and on target for completion late next year when the first houses are being occupied.
The resort operates a ‘design studio’, or type of concierge service for purchasers, in which all aspects of construction, including interior fitout and landscape design, are handled on their behalf.
Existing section owners at The Reserve include former Prime Minister, Sir John Key, and former Black Caps captain and England Test cricket coach, Brendon McCullum.
Hunt hopes the first house-and-land packages at The Rockery, 13 sections on the other side of the clubhouse, overlooking the practice green, will also be on the market towards the end of this year.
An underpass between the clubhouse and the concert venue and a neighbouring ‘vintner’s village’, on the other side of the Gibbston highway, should be under construction by late next year or early 2025, Hunt says.
The release of the first fixed-price house-and-land packages comes, ironically, exactly a year after the developers cancelled contracts on 28 properties in The Vines residential/visitor accommodation enclave, opposite Gibbston Valley Winery.
That was due to post-Covid cost increases they’d not foreseen.
Hunt says they’re still considering this development, but not in the short term.
A second highway underpass will connect The Vines with the winery.
