This client approached Coldicutt Blackman with a goal. Their issue? House was too big for their needs and they were looking for some extra income.

The solution? 

What are we seeing pop up all around Auckland as our city glows and people want to live closer to the central city? Townhouses. What could be done to this two story home to solve our client's issues? Townhouses! 

Not your normal townhouse

This isn't the usual story of bowl every house in site and replace them with shoeboxes, this existing house was split. Downstairs is one dwelling with its own parking and entrance and upstairs is dwelling two with a garage, parking and its own front door.

Every job has it's challenges

This job was no different, when you have two connected dwellings, they need to be safe and functional for all occupants. This means retroactively installing passive fire on any and all party walls. With Coldicutt Blackman's skills and experience working in retirement villages, passive fire was a challenge we were well equipped to handle and the project went as smoothly as possible.

Function and form

To ensure the downstairs dwelling felt open and comfortable, we had to knock down a large section of load bearing block wall. to achieve this result, Coldicutt Blackman propped the top floor off the ground floor and cut the wall out with a concrete saw. Simple enough, except it wasn't. Due to lazy construction practices when the dwelling was first built, a whole host of live electrical cables were cast into the concrete support for this load bearing wall. Luckily, the guys on site were very careful during their demolition and they managed to get the wall removed without damaging any of the cables which where critical to the occupants living upstairs during construction. 

Conclusion

Coldicutt Blackman managed to convert this two story house into two beautiful homes so our clients could use the space downstairs to earn some much needed subsidiary income. This project took two months and the whole job was completed without being too invasive for the clients who were still living in the home during the building process. If you have some odd plans that you'd like to bring to life, get in touch with us today!