If buying a whole house on your own is out of reach, buying most of one with a partner alongside you may not be. Shared ownership is not a compromise so much as a different order of operations.
You buy a share of a property — commonly 65 to 85 percent — and a partner owns the remainder. You live in the whole home and pay a mortgage on your share only. Over time you buy out the co-owner’s share, generally at its market value at the point you buy it. The co-owner may be Kāinga Ora through the First Home Partner scheme, a commercial shared ownership provider, or family or friends buying alongside you as tenants in common. The practical effect is that your deposit and your servicing only need to cover a share of the property rather than all of it, which is often the difference between buying now and continuing to rent.
People have always bought their first homes with help. A parent going on the title, siblings buying together, a family loan that never quite gets documented: shared ownership is what happens when that arrangement is written down properly and given a structure.
The version that trips people up is the informal one. Two friends buy a house, nobody writes anything down, and three years later one of them wants to move to Melbourne and the other cannot afford to buy them out. The house gets sold at the wrong time, at the wrong price, and the friendship does not survive it.
Every workable shared ownership arrangement — government, commercial or family — is built on a document that answers the awkward questions before anyone needs the answers. Who pays what. What happens if someone stops paying. How the property gets valued. Who can force a sale, and when. Get that right and shared ownership is a genuinely good route into a home.
Government shared ownership on eligible new builds. Kāinga Ora takes a share alongside you and you buy it back over time. Income and eligibility criteria apply and are reviewed periodically — check the current position on kaingaora.govt.nz.
Private shared ownership providers operate in the New Zealand market, typically funding a minority share of the property with a defined buy-back path. Terms, fees and the buy-back mechanism differ meaningfully between providers, so compare carefully.
A parent, sibling or partner buys a defined share with you as tenants in common. The most flexible option and usually the cheapest, but the one most often done without proper documentation.
Two or more buyers pooling deposits to reach a purchase neither could manage alone. Workable, but only with a property sharing agreement covering exit, default and death.
Sometimes what a family member actually wants is to help without owning part of your house. A limited guarantee over their property can achieve that without a shared title.
A smaller part of the market, where rent contributes towards an eventual purchase. Terms vary considerably and warrant close reading before committing.
If you take one thing from this page: get a property sharing agreement drafted by a lawyer, and get it done before settlement, not after.
It should cover, at minimum: each party’s share and what each contributed; who pays the mortgage, rates, insurance and maintenance, and in what proportion; what happens if one party cannot pay; how and when a party can exit; how the property is valued at buy-out; who has first right to buy; what happens on death, separation or bankruptcy; and how a deadlock gets resolved.
That is a conversation nobody enjoys having at the start. It is dramatically better than having it in the middle of a crisis with no agreement to point at. Every lender will want to see the arrangement documented too, so it is not optional in practice.
We can talk you through how lenders assess shared ownership and what they will need. The agreement itself is your lawyer’s work — and it is worth paying for properly.
An arrangement where you buy a share of a property and someone else owns the rest. You live in the whole home. Over time you buy out the other party’s share, usually at the market value at the time of purchase. The co-owner may be a government scheme, a commercial provider, or family.
Yes, on your share. If you are buying 80 percent, you need a deposit and a home loan covering that 80 percent. The advantage is that the total you have to fund is smaller, so a deposit that would not stretch to a whole house may stretch to a share of one.
A government shared ownership scheme where Kāinga Ora buys a share alongside you in an eligible new build, and you buy that share back over time. It is limited to new builds and has eligibility criteria including an income cap. Check kaingaora.govt.nz for the current terms.
Yes, and it is common. Two or more people buy together as tenants in common in defined shares. It works well with a proper property sharing agreement drawn up by a lawyer before settlement, covering what happens if one party wants out, cannot pay, or dies. Do not skip that document.
That depends entirely on the agreement, which is why the agreement matters so much. Most schemes and well-drafted private arrangements set out a process: how the property is valued, who gets first right to buy, how long the other party has, and how the proceeds are split.
It is a trade-off, not a trap. You give up part of the capital gain on the share you do not own, in exchange for owning something now instead of later. Whether that is a good trade depends on how long the alternative would take and what you would pay in rent in the meantime. It is worth doing the maths rather than assuming either way.
The other main route in when a full deposit is out of reach.
KiwiSaver, grants, costs and the full first home process.
Model repayments on a share rather than a whole property.
It suits some people very well and others not at all. Let’s work through the numbers on your specific situation and find out which you are.