A place to lock it all away

The demise of the quarter-acre section is seeing growing demand for self-storage units in Rotorua.

Two new self-storage companies have joined the market in the past month to cater for people needing extra space to stow their belongings.

The latest arrival - Superior Storage - has plans to build up to 800 units at the Eastgate Business Park opposite Rotorua airport.

The first stage of development is under way with 100 units of various sizes expected to be complete by early next month.

It follows construction of 106 storage units across town at Stowaway Self Storage, south of Ngongotaha.

Owners of both companies say there is plenty of room in the market for extra storage, with customers to benefit from the competition.

One of Superior Storage's four directors, Russell Leese, moved to Rotorua from Auckland to manage the multimillion-dollar development.

He said his company had "done their homework", calculating that Rotorua's self-storage market was undersupplied.

The average New Zealander needs 0.17sq m of storage space and a city the size of Rotorua needs nearly 12,000sq m.

When they did their research six months ago, existing facilities supplied less than half that.

Mr Leese said Rotorua was in a growth phase with more businesses moving to town and it followed they would also need more storage space.

"Because of its size, our facility is catering for commercial operators as well as the residential market," he said. "With the way Rotorua's booming and because the city is one of the cheapest places for storage in the northern region, it makes Rotorua very attractive.

"For example, it works out cheaper for Tauranga people to store their goods here and pay for the transport costs than store them in Tauranga."

Self-storage in Rotorua ranges between $12 and $60 a week, depending on size. That compares with up to $80 a week in Auckland.

John Stranks from Stowaway Self Storage said there was strong interest in units from people wanting to store items they had no room for at home.

That included everything from boats to cars to general household goods.

Sections in new subdivisions were generally smaller than the traditional "quarter acre" and that meant people had less secure storage space.

Street View, A6