G'day folks, I'm a newbee here, what do you think of this ?

We are retired, living in Sydney and hardly ever see our neighbours; we are tired of the traffic and want a community lifestyle in a semi rural location with easy travel to the kids in Sydney.

We've looked at over 50's villages but the homes are crammed into very small plots. We’ve looked at small acreage properties but they lack the community lifestyle. We've looked at Intentional Communities (communes) but they sound too hairy fairy and rather risky to me.

So, I'm thinking; why not find say 20 like minded people, set up a management company, buy a 100 acre property for say $3 million, build a few roads etc etc, buy your own Manufactured Home (typically $150k to $250K) and run the whole thing as a council approved Manufactured Homes village.

Is it possible to get planning permission for such a scheme ?.

If it can be made to work, it's a community lifestyle for around $500K on 100 acres.

Thanks, have fun
Paul C

Our neighbour is developing 3 x 5acre blocks and a local tried to punch his head. 20 investor owners on common land ? yikes..

If you have an subdivided 100 acres you are in for a torrid time i say, the legals would be a nightmare.
If you have a subdivided 100 acres with twenty residences it becomes an owners corporation. Which means shared insurance and shared costs of whatever the excess land consists of. That in itself has possibilities and disadvantages. It needs legal consensus of the original 20 residences.

Dear Paul,

We live in Australia's most liveable city - Melbourne.
And we're very happy here. We would not consider
what you're suggesting. However, when it was time for
us to move out of our homes - we'd be looking at
Retirement Villages, and if we couldn't find what we
wanted in the Melbourne are - my preference would be
towards the mid North Coast of NSW. Port Macquarie,
Coffs Harbour, South West Rocks, et cetera. There's
approx 108 Retirement Villages in the mid North Coast
area. I'm sure we'd find what we wanted at a price we could
afford and its an area that's within easy reach of both
Sydney and Melbourne.

cont'd ...

BTW - what you're suggesting is nothing new.
Developers have developed new areas of suburban
housing, retirement villages, and housing
communities in established country towns where
people can find the ideal life that you are seeking.
Admittedly what you're proposing might be difficult
to find 20 like-minded
people to join you. In any community no matter how
ideally it is planned disagreements, discrepancies,
and disappointments will eventuate.

Hi Paul & welcome.

You can still have a great community on acreage, I guess it depends on what you mean as a community. Mine covers about 75 square kilometres, but has been a great community.

Many are on acreage blocks from just one to about 30, but we all consider ourselves part of our central village. We have just a service station, hardware store, a produce store, a convenience shop & a tavern, but also the Community hall, little athletics, horse & pony club, soccer club, tennis & netball courts & the rural fire brigade in the same general area.

We have grown from 600 homes when we first started out rural watch, [neighbourhood watch for the bush], about 10 years ago to over a thousand now. I do find the greater number does dilute the community a little, but most of us still know each other, & join in all the projects involved.

Personally I wouldn't want to live any closer to my neighbours, new years eve parties were close enough thanks, but this type of spread out community can be pretty good, giving the best of both worlds.