How to subdivide property in NZ: A guide for beginners

Subdividing is no walk in the park, so why do it? There are a few commons reasons – for example:

• Cutting your large section up into smaller sections, each with an individual, saleable title. It’s fairly common for Kiwi homeowners to turn their large front or back lawns into a separate section via subdivision, to reduce their mortgage, free up some cash or set themselves up for retirement. 

• To redevelop an infill site by removing a larger home or homes and subdividing one lot into several then developing. 

• Greenfields development. A process where larger rural or undeveloped land is split into smaller residential sections. This can be a bit more complex than infill development in existing areas because you'll need planners, engineers, geotech, contamination consultants, urban designers, landscape architects and more. 

• Adjusting your boundaries: for example, if you were to sell part of your section to your neighbour. 

• Converting your cross lease property to fee simple. Cross lease properties are technically owned jointly by all land owners – converting these to fee simple or freehold requires splitting up the land. 

Whatever your reason for subdividing land in NZ, it’s important to figure out exactly how much it’ll cost before you get started. 

Subdividing can be surprisingly expensive. If you’re simply splitting one section into two and creating a new title you can expect to spend more than $100,000 to $150,000, but costs could be higher or lower depending on:

• What type of subdivision you’re doing.

• How many new titles you’re creating. 

• The requirements of your local council. 

• Any earthworks required. 

• The location of services (water, electricity etc) near the property. If services aren’t to the boundary, expect to spend more.

• The cost of professional services such as surveyors and geotechnical experts in your area. 

Want a bit of extra detail? Read more about the cost of subdividing your section. 

According to Armstrong Murray Lawyers, this is roughly how the subdivision process works in NZ: 

• To get started, you should engage a local surveyor with a good reputation and plenty of experience subdividing land. You should also talk to a lawyer in advance to make sure they’re ready when you need them. 

• They’ll help you prepare a subdivision plan, then draft and lodge a consent application with your local council. 

• If consent is given, usually it will come with conditions, such as building consent, engineering plan approval, and geotech report approval. 

• Meanwhile, you or your surveyor will apply for survey plan approval, otherwise known as a section 223 certificate. You’ll also need to apply for a section 224 to confirm conditions can be met. 

• You and your surveyor will work through the conditions together with the help of the relevant professionals. You might need to connect services to the boundary, ensure the land is safe to build on, build a driveway or provide drainage. 

• At this stage, you’ll need a property lawyer to give you and your surveyor a hand lodging a survey plan with Land Information New Zealand (LINZ). This will include lodgement for new titles. 

• Wait a wee while for LINZ to issue your new title and voila – you have a new section. 

Before you get cracking with your subdivision it’s a good idea to check with your lender if you need finance for the subdivision – and to see if they need to adjust your current mortgage. 

If you’re selling sections off next to your property it can be a good idea to impose covenants, or rules, that restrict what owners can and can’t do on the land. For example, positive covenants may require that certain materials are used, or that a hedge is grown to protect your privacy. Restrictive covenants are the opposite – they prevent owners from doing certain things on their land, such as building two stories.