Transcription
With all of the craziness in the world today, more people than ever are dreaming of escaping the cities and going back to nature. And today, here in the Coromandel, we're about to meet one woman who has done exactly that by building a spectacular off-the-grid shipping container home.
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Hi Rosie, how are you? Nice to meet you. It's lovely to meet you. And wow, this place really is something else, isn't it? She's a beauty. How did you come to be here, first of all? I sold my house in Auckland and I was looking for some land or something to move out of Auckland. And I just saw it on Trade Me and I took the day off work and came down that day so that I could find it. And as soon as I got out of the car, I was like, "Yeah, I need to live here." I was able to buy the house because when I met my husband, I sold my Auckland property and moved in with him. And so, basically, I live in Auckland in his house and it freed up some of my finances so that I could actually do this.
And this estate is a little bit different, isn't it? Can you tell me a bit about the land we're on right now? So, Mahakadel Forest Estate is, um, it's a reserve. It's a privately owned reserve. We've been given status for a sanctuary. And basically, it's 25 lots over 1100 acres. Wow. And at 23 acres, mine's the smallest of all the lots. It's beautiful, beautiful bush and it's 95 QEII covenanted, so it's all about guardianship and looking after the native creatures. And, yeah, it's different. It's great. Beautiful.
And then to take full advantage of your 23 acres, you have built this beautiful shipping container home. I have, yep. And this home is made up of four 20-foot shipping containers, isn't it? Yes, that's right. So, four 20-foots are the living space, so it's 60 square meters. And then there's a utility container as well, which is a 20-footer, which is our mudroom that we walk through. And it's also got a sectioned-off area at the back, which is where we keep our batteries from the inverter and all of that stuff for the solar.
And why did you choose to build your home out of shipping containers? I really like the industrial look and I had heard really good things about how long they last and how strong they were. And I thought, sometimes I change my mind, so if I wanted to put another level on the top or come out the sides, I could. It would be a little bit easier to expand. So I thought, this is my starting point, anyway.
And you're totally off-grid in this home, aren't you? Yes, we are. We've got, uh, 12 solar panels and a four-kilowatt system inverter, two 25,000-liter tanks, and a worm composting septic system. So we've kind of ticked all the boxes. Yep, totally off-grid. Being off-grid to me, well, it was a dream, but it's also, there's that feeling of it's very empowering and it's a safe feeling knowing that I've always got water with no water rates and I've got power with no power bills and things like that. And you know, if anything happens in the world, I'm okay.
And then I can see you've created this lovely outdoor entertaining space here. Yes. Before the house was here, when we just had the caravan, this was our main kind of gathering area and we used to cook on the fire and things like that. And now it's for marshmallows. But it's lovely here. We spend a lot of time out here. So this has the afternoon and evening sun, and the other side of the house has the morning sun. So between the two sides, there's always a sunny spot or a shady spot if it's too hot. The perfect balance. Perfect. Yeah. And I can see you're doing lots of planting here as well. Yes, it's getting there. Now that the house is here, just trying to plant as much as we can that wants to live here, that isn't going to get all eaten by the possums. And basically, things that are edible or, um, things that are medicinal.
And you've given your home a very special name, I see. Yes, we have. We've named her, which means sacred space, because it honors the fact that it's a really old forest and the local iwi have acknowledged the land here. Beautiful. And my daughter painted it, who's an artist. So she's done some of the artwork inside the house as well, which we can see. Oh, how lovely that she could contribute to the home. Wow. Yeah, it's kind of, it's, it's her space as well. Yeah, very special.
Well, this home just looks so cool and I cannot wait to see the inside. Can we check it out? Come and have a look. Thank you very much.
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Having a mudroom like this is such a good idea, isn't it? Because especially when you live in the forest, having that nice separation between indoors and outdoors and the transition between them is really important. Oh, 100%. It gives us somewhere to kick off our muddy gumboots, put all our sort of trapping gear down, and then just kind of go into the house. And it's quite nice. Absolutely. And also being able to keep the utilities separate from the main house is a great idea as well. Oh, completely. And keeping that hum of the inverter as far away from the bedroom as possible. You do get used to it, but it's nice to sort of not have it in a cupboard in the home. Yeah.
And so in there is where you've got all of your batteries stored as well? That's right. So that's where the inverter and the solar batteries are, and the power board. And because the inverter generates heat, it's also where we put things like our kindling and our paper for the, for lighting the fire, to keep it dry. And we also put our washing in there and dry our washing in there in winter. What a good idea.
And then the main house is through there? Yep. Come and have a look. Let's have a look. Oh my gosh, that view is just ridiculous. Panoramic, right to the horizon. And I really love the way that the house almost completely wraps around the deck and then just takes full advantage of that spectacular vista. Yep, definitely. It's the sort of house is placed so that from every single window, we can see the view. Fantastic.
And then this kitchen is just huge. Yeah, it's pretty big, isn't it? Bigger than I thought it would be. I love cooking, obviously, and it's the best kitchen I've ever had. Yeah, it's really practical as well. So the cabinetry is, um, their tool trolleys from Bunnings. I was going to ask about that too, because it's really unusual. It gives it almost a commercial kitchen look. It makes it look sort of very high-spec, but these are actually tool trolleys. They're tilt trolleys from Bunnings, which is, I think you just took the tops off, put the bench on. Every one of them is lockable. This one's on wheels still. The other ones obviously have been mounted. So I can move this out of the way if I want, if we're having parties, which we do sometimes. So, yeah, it's really awesome. Wow.
And did that work out cheaper than built-in cabinetry? A lot cheaper, I would say. Yeah. So they were on sale at Bunnings, which is why I bought them all. And I think we got all of the cabinetry for under three thousand dollars. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah, pretty impressed. Yeah. I really like what you've done here with the colors as well, because you've got these orange walls that really lift the space, but then you've got all of this beautiful natural exposed plywood as well. Yeah, it's patchy. Yeah. And that was this point. This is where we relax. So it was really nice to have that. And I love color anyway. I've never been afraid of color. And orange, it just pops. And when the sunrise comes in in the morning and it hits the orange, the whole room glows. It's gorgeous. Yeah. Hard not to feel happy in an orange room. Totally. I agree 100%.
And then you've got the wood fire there as well. Yep. So the wood fire is wonderful because it's the smallest one that I could, that suited the space, that had the oven underneath it. So we can cook underneath if we ever run out of gas. We can cook on the fire as well, because it's, you know, we're in the middle of the mountains, so it's, you can't just pop to the shop to get some more gas. And so it's kind of that practical aspect to it as well. But it heats the whole house up so quick that sometimes I have to open the door after I've let the fire because it's a bit warm. Yeah.
Because of course, being a shipping container as well, you would have insulated this really well. Yep. So it's eco-insulation, it's double-glazed windows. Um, I've never had a house that was insulated before. It's lovely. I've always had houses, they're really cold in winter and really hot in summer. So the difference between the living space and the mudroom, which isn't insulated, is huge. Yeah. And temperature-wise. Yeah. And noise from the rain and things like that as well.
And then over here, this isn't a bookshelf, this is your own personal library. Yeah, it is. I've always wanted a floor-to-ceiling library. There's probably two decades of op-shopping and book sales gone into the library. And I'm, yeah, I'm really, really happy with it. Wow. And look at how organized you are as well. Yeah, it's one of the few areas of my life I'm actually organized in. Who's my library? Calling it the Rosie classification system because it makes sense to me. So I know where to find all my, all my study books, and just a whole array of non-fiction and good sci-fi as well. I am very impressed.
And then you've got this lovely chair here as well, as the perfect little reading nook. It is. This is just curling up on the chair in winter with the fire on and a glass of wine on one of the library shelves. It's a really hard life. Yeah, it must be indeed.
And then again, around here, I just love how you've got the floor-to-ceiling window to just fully capitalize on that view. Yep, 100%. It's really important. I thought from any angle, we can see that view. Yeah, definitely. That is a serious telescope you've got. It's pretty lovely. I got that for my birthday last year. And dragging it out on the deck when it's a still night. As you know, Coromandel's dark sky, it's stunning. Absolutely stunning. Yeah. Your night sky views must be unbelievable here. They are.
And then what do we have over the other side of the home? So the other side is another 20-foot container. We've got the bathroom at one end and the bedroom at the other. Right. Beautiful barn sliding door is the entrance way there too. Yeah, that was one of the things I splashed out on. I just really love how striking it is when you first come in. Yeah, absolutely. Can we have a peek at the bathroom? Sure. Bathroom's just this way. Oh, lovely. Those floor-to-ceiling tiles in here are beautiful. Yeah, they're pretty stunning, eh? It's a bathroom jib, so it's actually not tiles, but it looks like really lovely concrete tiles. Well, it definitely fills me. That's a great look. Yeah, definitely. Nice-looking vanity. Oh, yes. One of my many op-shop finds that I've been hoarding over the years. Very nice.
And then the toilet as well. So obviously here, it just looks like a regular flushing toilet, but it is anything but. Yep, that's right. So it flushes like a normal regular toilet, except that it goes down. There's a black water and grey water tanks. So the black water tank from the toilet goes to the worm composting system, and the grey water, which is from the sink and the shower, go into the grey water tank. So, yeah, it's no difference for us, right? Except that it goes for the worms.
And nice shower in here too. Yep. So I went for a bigger shower, which actually backs onto the wardrobe in the bedroom, because I'm an occupational therapist and I put my OT hat on and I wanted it big enough that when we're really old, we can put a shower chair in there. And the towel rail is actually a grab rail, and it's on the studs and things like that. So I'm sort of future-proofing here. Yeah. And it really is a good idea to future-proof like that. And not only for when you get old, also just if you get an injury or something like that, it's always good to think about. A hundred percent.
And then your bedroom is behind us here? Yep. So it's just one bedroom in the house and, um, yeah, this is it. Lovely. Again, look at those views. Yep. Having the sunrise come in in the morning. And no curtains, obviously. There's no neighbors, so we don't need curtains. And waking up and looking at the view, looking at the stars in the middle of the night, it's, it's just stunning. Yeah. And this is a king-sized bed, which was the biggest bed I thought would comfortably fit in here. It is a great-sized bed.
And then your wardrobe behind us here? Yeah. So the wardrobe is just shelves because I don't own things that need hanging up. And so it's also the linen cupboard, so it's got the linen in it. And then just things that we're not quite sure where to put, go in the wardrobe. Nice way to keep it all simple. Yep, definitely. I like it. And even more book storage in here. Yeah, this earlier converted. The bed head is more books because I ran out of room obviously in the other end of the house. So this is a section of the biography, autobiographies. I just moved a whole section of books into here. I can curl up in bed and read an autobiography or something like that. They're right on hand.
And so you're not living in this home full-time right now, but the plan is to retire here in the future? Definitely. And hopefully even before then, depending on, we're work-based in Auckland at the moment, so I come down as often as I can. And I work from here sometimes as well on my off-clinic days, which is really great. And, yeah, eventually this is where we'll be.
And how are you finding the place working out for you so far? It's exactly as I pictured it in my head, which is pretty good because I'm quite a big daydreamer. And so that's been lovely. And it's, I walk in and I go, after my crazy Auckland week, and it's just, you can't not relax here.
And can we talk about the cost that was involved in building this home? Sure. So the house itself is up around $450,000. But because I'd sold my Auckland home to buy it, and comparing to Auckland prices, it actually seems like a pretty good-sized mortgage. It's doable. Making a space my own has been a really interesting journey because I've planned this house in my head years ago, and then the tweaks, and then going, "Oh, actually, no, I want this," and "No, now I want this." And it's been a really lovely way for me to put myself into the house. People are saying, "Oh, it's a perfect Rosie house," because it kind of is. It's me all over the house. And it is the designing it from scratch was lovely. It was like, I'm really proud because I'd never designed a house before. I've never built a house before. And so thinking about what did I want? I wanted off-grid, and I wanted the sun, and I wanted the views, and I wanted the community. And I kind of got all of that. So, yeah, I feel really privileged for having this. And so everything's now leading towards living here permanently eventually.
Well, Rosie, this home is absolutely beautiful. I love what you've created here with the shipping container home, and I just cannot get over the incredible view that you have from your property. Thank you so much for sharing it. Thank you for coming and having a look. My pleasure. Cheers.
What Rosie has created here is nothing short of brilliant. This is a wonderful home that perfectly encapsulates her ideas and philosophies and the way that she wants to live in the world. And ultimately, for all of the trials and tribulations of creating a place like this, getting to sit back here on a couch like this and enjoy that view at the end of the day makes everything more than worthwhile.
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