Sharing Rural property

Hi I was wondering if anyone had any information on how several families could share and live on a rural property in NSW?

Myself and a couple of families have a dream of owning a property on a river in NSW a few hours from The Illawarra.

We’d all be off grid in our own fenced areas within the property and then share the remainder

We may farm or even run some sort of business like eco tourism amongst other ideas on the shared area.
Each family would own an equal share of the overall property though drawn up legally.

I do understand however that additional dwellings are an issue on rural title yes?

We all want to live off grid and tiny homes would even suit but I don’t think the legislation would allow us to accommodate as many as we would need either over the property.

Would a Community Title Scheme be something to look into on rural land? Or even possible?
Would a property holding several DPs/sections be allowed extra dwellings?
Or I have heard the term eco village is this something that would help us?
Hoping someone here might know of a way to make this happen.
It’s a little out of the ordinary.
none of the families are in a financial position to buy property on their own but altogether could manage a decent property in the areas we’re interested in.

 

In most instances there is only a single dwelling entitlement on a rural block in order to discourage the use of productive land for the sole purpose of housing. Other controls include minimum lot sizes.

If dwellings are off grid, they'll require septic or envirocycle type waste disposal, these have differing land requirements.

Look for land with an appropriate zoning which may allow tourism accommodation or the like.

 

Thankyou. Yes composting toilets etc..
So tourism accommodation may not allow full time if have to look into that
What zoning would we be looking for do you know?

 

This might be the wrong place to ask that question

Maybe a fb group or community in relation to living off grid might be more help.

Legally you might have a hard time achieving your goals without resulting on a property that is capable of being a caravan park etc. My assumption is that you want a location that is well secluded etc which would make it harder. Most councils would want amenities (water/power/sewage) as a minimum.

Im on a tiny homes fb page. I am not at all interested in the off the grid lifestyle but on there in relation to interest in small dwellings.

Have noticed there are posters with similar ideas to yours but most of the comments in relation to solutions or how people are doing it seem to not care about what is legal/not or try to push the law. Lot of people on that page also appear to be disengaged with the government for whatever reason.

What I did gather was if a dwelling was on wheels it could be legally considered a caravan. Some councils made this easier to be placed on properties provided it is not permanent (I think 30-90 days at a time). I believe the loophole is that you can move it off the property and back to reset the timer.

Personally think its possible if considering having a second home. Having it legally as a main residence for multiple residences I think would be close to impossible. Though there may be councils out there being generous.

 

Also financially you might find buying individual properties (land) cheap. The tiny homes for off the grid living are very expensive. These are luxury products and unless your buying imported that are not approved for Australian use, the costs are more than what a normal house costs for something tiny.

 

I’m not sure about the legal logistics of it all but my parents have 100 acres with 4 dwellings on it. There are 2x 3 bedroom fully renovated houses, 1x 1 bedroom renovated 2 storey unit and the main house has 3 bedrooms - yet to be renovated. I have also seen house plans for a larger 5th dwelling but I don’t know much about that. Currently they rent the three renovated properties which are all fully self contained and separate but the pool in the centre of the property is shared.

 

Often large farms are on multiple titles next to each other

 

There is a large rural property near us that has council approval and has multiple dwellings, tourism, shared farm work etc. Owners buy a 'shareholding' including property and some land. I don't know a whole lot about it but I know they had lots of rules they had to abide by eg, all the dwellings had to be built near each other, not spread over the property. Their website talks more about it if you want to have a look:
Shepherds Ground Farm and Village | Butterwick NSW | Community