Owning an apartment in the historic Courtville building is so much more than the square metres within your own unit.
There's the heritage of the building for a start, entitling it to an A listing with Heritage New Zealand.
It's no wonder when you see the architectural details; the warmnative timbers of the matai floors, heart rimu doors and the stained-glass windows throughout the building, including the door to the lift on each level.
But there's also a magnificent roof space for owners to share, with amazing views over neighbouring rooftops to the harbour and Hauraki Gulf and sweeping across the city to the museum.
Interestingly enough, Donald and Sally McKegg had both admired Courtville long before they met and married.
Then 10 years ago, Sally saw an ad in the NZ Herald for this ground-level 90sq m apartment. They came to check it out and it took all of five minutes for Sally to decide to buy it.
At first, it was somewhere for one of their daughters to live. Then she decided to head south to Dunedin to study.
Another daughter followed suit and as the couple's two-storey six-bedroom house emptied out, Donald and Sally decided it was time to sell a house that had become too big for just the two of them, and to move into the apartment that had always held a special place in their hearts.
Apartment for sale in Courtville, 21/11 Parliament Street, Auckland City.
"We had been renting it out but we had always said it would be a nice place to retire to," says Donald.
They have been here for six years and Donald says in some ways it feels like living in a villa because of the high studs and villa-like designs of the rooms.
Their apartment looks out to Waterloo Quadrant, although passers-by can't really see into the apartment as it is slightly elevated above street level.
"I sit at my desk by the window and watch the people going by, the traffic," Donald says.
The couple often take their dog for a walk in the nearby parks or pop down to the Chancery where they like the restaurants and bars.
Donald and Sally have configured the multi-room apartment as one bedroom (with impressive bay window) with a lounge, dining room, tiled bathroom with bath and overhead shower, kitchen plus a room just beyond the kitchen. (Donald explains this was once a porch in the building's early years but was soon closed in.)
Apartment for sale in Courtville, 21/11 Parliament Street, Auckland City.
"A lot of people have used similar apartments here as two or three bedrooms."
"I love that it is of its era," he says, explaining the building dates back to 1918. "It is having its centenary in a couple of years. One reason it got the A listing is that it is one of the first high-rises in New Zealand and it's definitely the first residential elevator in the country."
The building has 15 residences over five floors, the rooftop and a basement which has a communal laundry and was originally where women would come in to launder for all the apartments, popping clean clothes in numbered cubbyholes and ringing apartment bells to notify residents.
At the top of the building's stairwell is the defining dome and stained-glass windows which light up beautifully at night.
Apartment for sale in Courtville, 21/11 Parliament Street, Auckland City.
It will be a wrench when Donald and Sally sell the apartment but having two daughters living in Dunedin has led the couple to buy a house there.
"I said if I can handle the winter, we will do the move. We bought a house there and the winter was wonderful," says Donald. But he says he will be back to visit Auckland regularly as they are keeping another apartment they have in Milford.
