A former rental home of Rotorua resident Susan Gedye is now up for sale for just $110,000. Photo / Ben Fraser
A former rental home of Rotorua resident Susan Gedye is now up for sale for just $110,000. Photo / Ben Fraser
One Rotorua home is helping give new meaning to the term overheated market.
The three-bedroom weatherboard house at 12 Meade St in Whakarewarewa is on sale for just $110,000 and includes a sleepout and 854sq m section of land.
"Hot property" the home's sale listing on NZME-owned property website OneRoof proclaimed.
Yet there was - of course - a reason for the discounted price.
And that was due to the home's former tenant Susan Gedye almost landing in hot water last year when a steaming, bubbling mud pool flared in the backyard.
Gedye's experience even caught the attention of international media outlets when her home started shaking just after midnight on June 25, 2019.
"It was about two o'clock in the morning and I thought there was a big earthquake happening - it was shaking the whole house, like big jolts," Gedye told the Herald at the time.
When the shaking lasted longer than a typical earthquake, Gedye went to the kitchen where she heard hissing and thought "shoot, something's not right here".
"(I) looked out the kitchen window and saw a big geyser coming out of the bank, it was just like a big pile of steam," she said.
"I kind of panicked because it was shaking everything and I thought, 'Oh, it's gonna blow up under the house'."
Gedye immediately called in council experts. They advised she could safely spend the rest of the night in the rental home.
But by morning, mud blobs the size of bowling balls were launching into the air.
"It had really changed, there was mud flying everywhere and the bank had come away," she said.
Council experts later ruled the home unsafe and Gedye moved out.
Just over one year later, the property was now being listed for sale with Harcourts real estate agent Trevor Cochrane.
"This three bedroom property and the sleepout cannot be lived in, as directed by the Rotorua Lakes Council. It is to be sold 'as is where is'," the advertisement stated.
"This is due to thermal activity creating a big hole on the section on June 26, 2019. The kitchen has been removed. There is an opportunity to remove the house."
Cochrane told the Herald there was no thermal activity at the property at the moment.
There was also the possibility of a future owner staying temporarily on the site.
Bubbling with potential. This three-bedroom Rotorua home is now up for sale. Photo / Gavin Ogden
"You can't live in the house, but we've made enquiries and you can have a motorhome or a caravan on the section as long as they can move it off," Cochrane said.
He said he'd had a lot of people dip their toes in with enquiries about the property but no one yet ready to take the plunge and buy it.
"Like I tell people, the hole is for free," he said.
For her part, Gedye recently told the Herald she and her 2-year-old daughter had since moved in with her father.
Having earlier run a beauty business from the Meade St rental - Gedye was initially forced to postpone bookings after moving out.
But then she began meeting customers in her dad's lounge room before building a cottage in his back garden where she can provide beauty treatments in comfort.
She said she was still in touch with the Meade St homeowners who had shown her nothing but sympathy throughout the experience.
Ultimately, the incident had left her more grateful and reflective about "how different it could've been".
"It could've been under the house, me and baby could've been playing in the yard when it happened," she said.
