"I honestly think this is one of the best properties in Dalefield, if not the whole Basin," says local New Zealand Sotheby’s International Realty agent Hadley van Schaik, who’s marketing 530 Littles Rd with colleagues Justine Burke and Gerard Bligh.
The 530 square metre four-double bedroom home was built in 1999 by Naylor Love to a design by Dunedin’s Mason & Wales.
The clients were the late Harry Price, legendary CEO of Westpac’s New Zealand arm for seven years, and Margaret Bramley, whose dad was a Naylor Love principal.
The couple bought "just two sheep paddocks", Bramley says.
They employed local award-winning landscape architect Ralf Kruger to design a garden in the style of a European park, which includes a huge number of trees, multiple walkways, stone retaining walls, ponds, rhododendron glades and hedges.
There’s an outdoor heated swimming pool and a private folly — a stone structure, designed as a place for contemplation, that’s common on big English estates — which directly overlooks the Shotover River.
The couple named their property ‘Rivendell’, a reference from The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit to a kingdom above the river.
She’s most enjoyed the views — "it’s sort of right around, and we look over the river" — and the isolation.
"You don’t hear the traffic running past."
Van Schaik says the 4.0884-hectare property’s in two titles — the lower one, off Littles Rd, and the elevated one, which the house is built on.
He notes the two titles are for sale as one, but a buyer could apply to build on the lower title and/or sell it off.
Van Schaik’s particularly taken with the grounds, which are now very mature — "I mean, this is irreplaceable".
Burke’s impressed by the fact the home’s completely clad in Central Otago schist — "in today’s market, people just don’t build like that".
And the home, she says, has great bones.
"It’s still in keeping with the Mason & Wales designs of today, with beautiful white American oak throughout."
Kitchen appliances, excluding fridge/freezer, were replaced last year, Van Schaik notes.
"Someone may come through with an interior designer and do a full refurbishment if they want."
Van Schaik says there’s been good enquiry for the property — it’s for sale by deadline sale closing June 7.
He thinks it could be snapped up by "an inter-generational buyer who’s going to hold this for a long time".
The property’s capital valuation’s $10.81million, but he’s expecting it will fetch north of that figure.
