- Nigel and Shelley Lowe sold Ranfurly Holiday Park to a Northland couple for just under $1m.
- The Lowes are returning to teaching in Timaru after six years running the park.
- The new owners, experienced in accommodation business, plan to maintain the operations.
A Kiwi couple who ditched both teaching and Auckland to run a holiday park in the South Island are on the move again.
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Nigel and Shelley Lowe made headlines in 2018 when they accused the then Government of failing teachers.
They left their jobs in South Auckland and bought Ranfurly Holiday Park, Motel and Cabins in Central Otago.
But now, with their children at secondary school 222km away in Timaru, they have sold up and moved north.
Nigel returned to teaching technology last year, while Shelley plans to pick up some relief work after finishing up at the campground at the end of May.
The couple have sold the campground to buyers from Northland, who had been operating some small accommodation units near Whangārei and wanted the next step up. The property first hit the market with a price guide of over $1.3 million but ended up selling for just under $1m.
Shelley and Nigel Lowe in 2018, when they quit their jobs as teachers. Photo / Newshub
Nigel told OneRoof the buyers couldn’t have chosen a better place.
“Central Otago and Ranfurly around that area – the scenery is absolutely stunning in winter and summer,” he said.
“It’s nice it is going to stay as a holiday park. When Shelley met them, she got a real good vibe from them.”
Tourism Properties principal Adrian Chisholm, who brokered the deal, said the buyers were the perfect fit. “They saw the opportunity and flew down and purchased it,” he said.
Chisholm said the campground had attracted interest from all over New Zealand and Australia. “It was obviously at a price point that people could afford, and it’s a big footprint in terms of the camping ground.”
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Nigel told OneRoof he never planned to return to teaching but when his kids’ school asked him to teach technology because they couldn’t find anyone to fill the role, he agreed.
He said his main focus as a technology teacher was to get kids into the trades. “They’ve got to know the basics, they have got to learn hand skills, and they’ve got to know how to read plans and measure.”
He used his own trade skills to carry out improvements at the holiday park by modernising the units and cabins and upgrading the bathrooms.
Nigel said moving to Ranfurly had been one of the best things he had ever done, and the sale still felt surreal.
“Shel and I have a lot of great memories, met some wonderful, wonderful people and movie crews and stuff, and I haven’t regretted it once.”
The couple subdivided 1200sqm of unused land off the front of the holiday park and planned to build a small holiday home on it.
“There’s too many lovely people down in Ranfurly that we would love to go back and see, but instead of having to work, we can actually go down and enjoy their company.”
Owning the holiday park had allowed the family to travel to Australia and Europe, which wouldn’t have happened on their teacher salaries. Back in 2018, the couple blasted the then Education Minister, Chris Hipkins, in a TV interview.
Nigel said teachers did not “get treated as professionals, we don’t get treated with respect”.
He said he was working 65 hours a week. His wife, a primary school teacher, worked the same on a wage of $52,000.
“I worked out her wage and divided it by all the hours she was doing, it worked out to be $13 something an hour, which to me is pathetic, so the Government need to pull their finger out,” Nigel told TV3.
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