Connect Portable Cabins
A spare room you can put back on the truck.
Sleepouts, home offices and extra bedrooms, delivered on a truck and craned onto your section in an afternoon. Hire one by the week or buy it outright. Built in our yard in Whangamatā, not shipped in from offshore.
Roughly what it costs
$70 – $110 a week to hire
Or buy one: roughly $18,000 for an 8 m² sleepout up to about $45,000 for a lined and insulated 20 m² unit. Delivery and craning on top, and that depends on how tight your access is. Minimum hire is usually four weeks.
Being portable doesn't make it exempt — the size does
Every cabin company leans on “no consent needed”, and plenty of customers hear “because it's movable”. That's wrong. The Building Act counts movable structures as buildings, so wheels and skids decide nothing. What decides it is floor area, what's plumbed into it and who did the design. We size and build to the exemption on purpose, and we tell you which one yours sits under before it leaves the yard.
Three ways a cabin stays consent-free
There are three separate exemptions, and which one applies changes who has to sign off. This is the whole picture:
- Up to 10 m²: the simplest. Single storey, no toilet or shower, no stored drinking water. Sleeping is fine if it's used alongside the house and has no cooking facilities. This is the size most hire cabins are built to
- 10–30 m², prefab or kitset: exempt when the manufacturer's design was carried out or reviewed by a Chartered Professional Engineer and the build follows that design
- 10–30 m², built on site: exempt when the design or construction is carried out or supervised by a Licensed Building Practitioner
- The 10–30 m² ones have to sit at least 1 m off any boundary and any house; single storey, floor no more than 1 m up and 3.5 m to the top
- Any of them with sleeping in it needs smoke alarms and no cooking facilities
- Put a toilet, a shower or a kitchen in it, or hook it to mains drainage, and the exemption is gone — that's a consented build, or a granny flat
Two things that catch people out, and neither is a building rule. Renting a cabin to paying guests can count as visitor accommodation and need resource consent. Renting one to a tenant long term brings the healthy homes standards with it. Your district plan still governs setbacks, site coverage and height whatever the exemption says. We check your zone before delivery rather than after.
What's in it
- Delivered on our own truck and craned into place
- Levelled and blocked up on piles or a prepared pad
- Insulated, lined and double glazed
- Power lead-in by a registered electrician, ready to plug in
- Beds, desk or shelving fitted out if you want it
- Smoke alarms fitted where it's used for sleeping
- Written confirmation of which exemption yours falls under
- Picked up and taken away again when you're done
How it goes
- 1
Tell us the size and the access
Size decides the exemption. Access decides whether it's a truck job or a crane job, which is the bit that surprises people on a tight Coromandel section.
- 2
We check your zone
A quick look at the district plan before anything's booked — setbacks, site coverage, and whether what you want to use it for is allowed where you are.
- 3
Hire or buy
Hire is weekly with a four-week minimum, delivery and pickup quoted up front. Buying is a fixed price including delivery and levelling.
- 4
Delivered and levelled
Usually a morning. We block it up level, get the power connected and hand you the keys.
- 5
Gone when you want it gone
On hire, give us a week's notice and we take it away. No demolition, no mess, nothing left on the section.
Questions people ask
Can I put a toilet or shower in it?
Not under any of the exemptions. The moment there's a bathroom, a kitchen or a connection to mains drainage, it's a consented build — and if you want it self-contained for family to live in, what you actually want is a granny flat under the 70 m² exemption.
Can I rent it out on Airbnb?
That's a resource consent question rather than a building one. Paying guests can count as visitor accommodation in some zones. We'll tell you what your zone says, but the council's the one who decides.
Can I rent it to a long-term tenant?
You can, but it brings the healthy homes standards with it — heating, insulation, ventilation, moisture and draught stopping — and the council will want to know about long-term living. Worth a conversation before you commit.
How long can I keep a hire cabin?
As long as you like. Most go out for six to twelve months — a renovation, a teenager who wants their own space, family over for a season. Four-week minimum at the start.
What if my section is steep or tight?
Most of the peninsula is. We look at the access before we quote, and we'll tell you straight if a cabin won't physically get in rather than finding out on the day.
Do I need a building consent at all?
Usually not, if it's sized and built to one of the three exemptions above and has no plumbing. We confirm which one yours sits under in writing. Your district plan still applies either way.
Also from Connect Build
Smaller job, or want a few prices rather than ours? Post it on Connect and vetted local tradies will quote it. Or email admin@connectcoromandel.co.nz.