Hunt for the Wilderpeople house sells for reported $7.9m

From wreck to stately home in less than three years, the restored 29A Hepburn Street, in Freemans Bay, Auckland. Photo: Supplied

A two-storey heritage villa that featured in the hit Kiwi film Hunt for the Wilderpeople has sold for a reported $7.9 million - more than $2 million above its 2017 CV.

The 140-year-old house in Freemans Bay, Auckland, had been in desperate need of repair when vendors Steve and Nicola Gregg bought it in 2017 for $1.625 million.

They spent almost three years restoring the villa to its former glory, often painting and sanding well into the early hours of the morning.

In an interview with OneRoof last year, just as 29A Hepburn Street hit the market, Mr Gregg said: “There’s not a single centimetre that we didn’t have to work on.

He said that although the structure of the house was fundamentally sound, various generations had made changes, some of which were not in keeping with the villa’s original look.

"We found Gib on top of Gib and other strange things,” he said.

What the house looked like in 2016 before the renovation. Photo: Michael Craig

The restored home, which was used as a backdrop in one of the city scene scenes in Taika Waititi's hit 2016 comedy, boasts five bedrooms and five bathrooms and high-quality fixtures, fittings and features, including crystal chandeliers and colourful leadlight glass windows and doors.

The couple told OneRoof that they had decided during the first lockdown to sell up. “It’s been a lot of work and now we just feel that life is for living so we’re contemplating a move to the Gold Coast, perhaps, and a smaller, easy-care property,” Mr Gregg said.

The house was originally owned by merchant and Auckland deputy mayor Andrew Entrican and for about 70 years from the mid-1940s the house was known as Te Kainga Aroha when it was a hostel for young Maori women, until the maintenance costs were considered too great by its owners.

The house used to sit on a large site at 29 Hepburn Street, but after the section was subdivided, the house was moved 15.5m onto the newly created 29A Hepburn Street in 2017.

The villa still has its original features. Photo: Supplied

29A Hepburn Street was brought to market by Ray White Ponsonby agents Heather Lanting and Marty Hall in August last year and was sold in December. The $7.9 million reported sale price is the suburb's biggest of the last 12 months, eclipsing the previous record holder by $1.9 million.

The sale comes amid a flurry of big purchases at the top end of Auckland's housing market. OneRoof reported last week that a colonial style-home in Remuera sold for $15.5 million in August last year.

The biggest sale of the last 12 months was that of an Auckland home formerly owned by the Kiwi director of Shrek and the Chronicles of Narnia. It was purchased by former All Black Ali Williams and the sister of billionaire Zuru Toys owner Nick Mowbray for $24 million.