$100 million retirement village in Auckland

Green light for Ryman Healthcare’s $100 million retirement village in Auckland

A leading New Zealand retirement village operator Ryman Healthcare today announced it had been given the green light to go ahead with a $100 million retirement village in Auckland.

The Environment Court has given the final approval for Ryman to develop a village by the Remuera golf course in Abbotts Way.

The company plans to develop a village consisting of 245 apartments and villas, 60 serviced apartments, 132 hospital or resthome beds and a 31 bed special care unit on the 9.2 hectare site.

The village will include numerous lifestyle options such as a nine-hole golf course, an all weather bowling green, tennis courts, petanque court and an indoor swimming pool.

Managing director Kevin Hickman said Ryman intended to utilise the same construction team presently building the Grace Joel village in St Heliers in Auckland.

``We hope to commence construction toward the end of the year with apartments coming on stream during the 2004 year.’’

The village will provide homes for 580 elderly people, create over 100 construction jobs and 160 new permanent jobs. It will be the 14th village in the listed company’s stable.

Ryman has a philosophy of setting up retirement homes for the elderly within their established neighbourhoods, managing director Kevin Hickman said today.

``This is a great site because of its location in a prime part of Auckland. We’re pleased we’ve received the final resource consent. We have begun planning and site work will start later in the year,’’ Mr Hickman said.

Since floating on the New Zealand Stock Exchange in 1999, Ryman has developed six retirement villages. They plan to double the size of the company every five years.

Ryman is continuing to look for further development sites in the North Island. The company employs over 1000 people and has won the Best Retirement Village in New Zealand Award for the last three years.

Their 13 villages and five hospitals are in Invercargill, Dunedin, Christchurch, Wellington, Lower Hutt, Hamilton and Auckland.

They opened the Grace Joel retirement village in St Heliers last year. Ryman posted a record half yearly net profit figure of $7.6m (up 68 percent on the same period the previous year) for the six months to September 30 2002.

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