Former commune with ‘cow retirement village’ for sale

A 160-acre farm on New Zealand’s North Island is back on the market after spending a brief two years as a Hare Krishna community. 

A group of around 10 Hare Krishna adherents pooled their money to collectively purchase the property in 2022, OneRoof reports. 

At the time, COVID-19 was spurring dreams of moving to the countryside in many people around the world. 

Initially, the group had big dreams of creating a self-sufficient community including a food forest, temple, accommodation, community garden, and cow sanctuary. 

Some retired dairy cows continue to live on the site, where they are provided with protection rather than used for meat production by the group, who practise a vegetarian lifestyle. 

“It’s almost like a cow retirement village. They are just there to live out their lives in happy karma,” says Ray White agent Alex Smits. 

However, like other COVID tree changers who moved back to the city, the Hare Krishna group’s project ran out of steam once the pandemic ended. 

“Life got back to normal and no one relocated out so it kind of became superfluous to needs,” says Smits. 

He explains that while members occasionally visited the property, no one ended up making a permanent move. 

The property is for sale with Ray White Whangarei, where the agent hopes to fetch over $NZ1 million (about $AU903,000) for the 160-acre site.

There is a four-bedroom 1960s farmhouse from the property’s time as a dairy farm. The home comes with a pool, 27 fenced paddocks, and even an old airstrip. 

There are also glowworms on the property, the listing notes.