A 114-year-old historic home that ran as Paeroa’s only hospital for two decades is for sale for the first time in 57 years.
The Crowe family is selling the distinctive eight-bedroom home at 7 King Street in Paeroa where hundreds of the town’s babies were born including the owner’s sister.
The sprawling stately home, called Parkview, was bought by two nurses in 1941 who ran it predominately as a maternity hospital before it was decommissioned in 1964.
The heritage protected category B property was then converted back to a family home and was owned by two other people before the Crowe’s bought it in 1969.
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But after being home to three generations, the Crowe family is downsizing.
The owner’s son, Chris Crowe, told OneRoof the then family of six moved from a two-bedroom home to the King St property when he was three months old.
“The house came up. Mum hadn’t seen it and dad said to her casually that he was going to look at the house. Mum knew it because she grew up in Paeroa so he knew the house, everyone did and he came back that night with the ownership papers and said we bought it so she was as stunned as anyone.”
The house, known as Parkview, has been home to three generations of the Crowe family. Photo / Supplied
But even the five-bedroom home became too small as it ballooned to a family of nine along with foster children his parents helped care for.
Crowe said when they were growing up the rooms are always full.
In the 1980s, a second storey was built in the mid-1980s to include a further three bedrooms and a third lounge.
There is also a separate hobbies room and a study.
Crowe said it was a fantastic home to grow up in because it was close to the town, schools and across the road from the Paeroa Domain.
He, his siblings and a number of friends also spent hours and hours in the inground concrete pool when it was also added in the early 1980s.
“Eight kids turned to about 20 kids after school with all the local kids.”
Crowe said it would suit a family looking for a large home, someone wanting to run a bed and breakfast or boutique hotel or character home lovers who perhaps want to restore it to its former ornate glory. “It’s all perfectly liveable it’s not a doer upper... but someone could choose to bring it up a level.”
Richardsons listing agent Kylie Hedges, who is marketing the property with Tash Dawson, said it was a beautiful home that could appeal to someone from out-of-town who wanted the grand villa dream, but could not afford it in somewhere like Auckland.
She thinks a lot of locals will also be intrigued by it.
“I guess it’s been an icon. It’s been in the same family for such a long time and there are lots people, I’m presuming, would love to look through it. It’s one of those properties that if you have lived here for a little while you would have driven past it and thought I wonder what that’s like or what that’s like inside.”
