Ranch-style oasis for sale

When Mike Wight and his late partner Sandra Tumaru would travel or thrift shop together, they were often pulled towards the same item.

For 30 years the pair had the same taste and in 2004 they decided they would use their unique characters to their advantage and build a dream ranch-style home right below Mt Iron.

The house was inspired after they travelled America on their Harley Davidsons together in 2003, as part of the 100 years of Harley in the States.

The wild west-inspired home suits the Wānaka environment and is tucked away down a private cul de sac. The straw bale home has many recycled materials, featuring tractor seats, saloon doors, bridge beams, telephone poles and old timber.

‘‘I just like old stuff, stuff I can reuse.’’

The original idea was inspired by the ranches the couple saw in Santa Fe, and because both had a little bit of wild west in them, they wanted to replicate something similar.

‘‘We both knew what we liked, it made it really easy.’’

Three years ago, Ms Tumaru died after battling liver cancer and Mr Wight has put their home on the market as he wishes to down-size.

Sotheby’s real estate agent Luc Ravel said the property had already attracted international interest, with potential Australian buyers flying in this week to view it.

The three-bedroom, twobathroom home sits on a 4023sq m plot of land at 9 Balneaves Lane.

The home has multiple living areas, including a media room and a loft with built-in beds for seven. There are several outbuildings on the property, including a two-car garage housing the couple’s collectable cars and Harleys. It also features two railway carriages that had once been part of the Otago rail network.

The breakfast bar, which is milled from leftover timber used in the walls and ceilings, features old tractor seats.

Mr Wight said he was a former furniture finisher and had been collecting the materials for years in the hope of using it for a new build.

The couple completed the home in 2020 after travelling around the South Island for their collectables.

‘‘We went to an auction in Luggate and bought a whole lot of bridge beams. They were from a bridge in Palmerston. We hadn’t even designed a house at that stage, so we just stored them.’’

The truth windows revealing the straw bale walls are surrounded in a cog pattern that was used to make the true cogs of the TSS Earnslaw.

‘‘So there is a bit of history around the place,’’ he said.

‘‘A lot of the materials you can’t get now.’’

They also collected old doors originally from India at a second-hand sale in Dunedin. And telephone poles scattered around Central Otago.

Beyond the walls is a boardwalk with a river feature and even agave plants found in similar-style gardens in the heart of Mexico.

Ms Tumaru was a gardener by trade and took great pride in her own garden, he said.

Mr Wight works as a hire manager at Central Machine Hire and has been in Wanaka for 20 years. He said he had found the past three years unsettling but was looking forward to the new chapter in a new home.

‘‘I have my moments, there are a lot of memories here.

‘‘I don’t think it has sunk in or not yet.’’