Cheaper real estate and a lower cost of living in Dargaville are predicted to create growing demand for semi-retired Aucklanders. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Northland Inc, the regional council's economic development arm, wants to find out whether there's a viable market to build a retirement village in Dargaville as part of a plan to lure a growing number of semi-retired workers keen to quit the rat-race in Auckland.
The local body agency has issued
a tender for a feasibility study into developing a high-end, community-based retirement village in Dargaville on behalf of the town's newly formed community development board and Kaipara Grey Power who expect it would "yield both private and public benefits for the area".
Dargaville supports 10,000 people including the rural district communities while Kaipara has a population base of 17,000, with a growing proportion of elderly residents, and a shortage of housing and facilities has been identified by a number of health organisations in the area, the tender document said. At the same time, cheaper real estate and a lower cost of living are predicted to create growing demand, which is currently only catered to by three existing sets of units and two rest home facilities.
The study wants to determine whether the proposed market is suitable for a retirement village development, which previous investigations have estimated would cost between $3 million and $5 million, and identify the economic and social impacts a project would have on the region.
Northland Inc chief executive David Wilson told BusinessDesk that Auckland's rapid house price appreciation has had a halo-effect in other regions as people look further afield, but that the project was also part of a wider pitch to try to attract semi-retired New Zealanders in the "55-plus age group which are still pretty much engaged but are cashing up and heading north."
