When the new Granny Flat Legislation landed in January, most people assumed the same thing. Granny flat rules apply to secondary dwellings. A home you add to a property that already has one.
Turns out that’s not the whole story.
We had a client who owned a vacant section and wanted to build their first home on it, a home that would meet the granny flat exemption criteria. The question was whether the exemption could apply to a first dwelling, not just a second. It wasn’t obvious from the legislation. The rules didn’t specify either way. They just listed the criteria a build had to meet.
So, before we had an answer for our client, we went directly to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), aka the people who wrote the rules, and asked them straight. They confirmed it: yes, the building consent exemption can apply to a first home on a vacant site, if all the other criteria are met.
When we lodged the PIM (Property Information Memorandum) application, the council came back and said no. Honestly, we weren’t surprised, everyone is still finding their feet with legislation this new, councils included.
What most people don’t know is that MBIE, as the authors of the Building Act rules, can be contacted directly when an interpretation is in question. So that’s what we did. We went back to them, got written clarification specific to this situation, and presented that to the council. They took another look and approved it. The build is now underway.
We’re sharing this because the more you understand how the rules actually work, the better placed you are going in. You now know the exemption can apply to a first home, because MBIE has confirmed it. That’s not common knowledge yet, and it changes the conversation.
The legislation is still new, interpretations are still forming, and this won’t be the last time something gets read differently by different people. What we can do is stay across it, share what we’re learning as we go, and make sure that when questions come up, we know where to find the right answers.
If you have a vacant section and you’ve been wondering whether any of this could apply to you, it might be worth a conversation. We’re happy to take a look.