Down-sizing clients provide niche market

RB Building has a good relationship with local real estate agent Jo McIntosh of Bayleys Real Estate.  A friend of the couple, they joined forces at the start of Jo’s career with Rod and Odette asking her to sell the home they were then building.  She has become a successful saleswoman and as well as selling new RB Building homes, she will often bring to Rod and Odette clients who are keen to build in the area.  There is normally a home under construction which potential clients can view, also Aaron Jamieson of Wanaka’s AJ Design provides quality renders for clients to visualise their new home.  Odette says RB Building has lately been building more two-bedroom homes in Darfield, with a large amount of retiring farmers coming off the land or down-sizing families whose children have left home now looking for something smaller and easier to manage.

“We’re tapping into that market,” Odette says.

“We’ve already built a couple of two-bedroom homes, and we have plans in the council for the next one.”

But $1 million homes are also on RB Building’s radar. The company completed one recently in Springfield, designed by Salmond Architecture of Wanaka.  The home featured copper nailed, vertical cedar on the exterior, and a geothermal heating system including a series of buried pipes and heat recovery units in every room.  The same client has since had RB Building back to his place to build him a farm shed as well, with a three bedroom workers’ home to be built towards the end of the year.  Rod was doing all the building himself until the start of 2014 when a qualified builder joined the team. Although he has since moved on, Rod is now training an apprentice with the help of the Certified Builders ITAB apprenticeship scheme.  With the two of them putting up homes from the ground up, it is a great place to gain experience in all aspects of residential building.

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