HouseMe has kicked some big goals this year. Strong sales at Fieldays, new show home locations, two land and housing development trials underway including one in Central Hawke’s Bay, and the launch of a foundation system built to get people into a new home faster.
For a company plenty still write off as a tiny home outfit, it is a striking run, and the numbers back it up. HouseMe is currently ranked fourth in New Zealand by residential building consents in the first half of 2026.
“You’ve got what’s perceived to be a little tiny home company,” says Bryce Glover, general manager of sales and marketing at HouseMe, “and these guys are punching well above their weight in terms of output.”
Nowhere was that clearer than at Fieldays this June. For the last couple of years, Bryce had approached New Zealand’s biggest agricultural event with a grimace. It costs serious money to attend, and the mood had been flat enough that the team debated pulling out altogether. This year, something shifted.
“Everyone was upbeat. The sentiment was good,” he says. “We sold homes to farmers. For starters, we actually saw farmers.”
It wasn’t just HouseMe. Other exhibitors reported the same turnaround, tractors moving again after a year when they’d sold nothing. For Bryce, it confirmed something he’d been seeing in the paperwork for months.
Farmers are back
“We see it directly, because of the title on our sale and purchase agreements,” he says.
“I’ve never seen so many businesses listed as farms coming through as the purchaser.”
It is a useful barometer, because HouseMe’s business is not concentrated in the cities.
“Auckland’s doing it tough. Christchurch’s upbeat, Queenstown’s its own economy. But our core market is regional New Zealand, and that’s being propped up by the primary sector,” Bryce says.
The proof arrived on HouseMe’s own doorstep this month in Cromwell. Unsure the site would be ready, the team only started promoting its grand opening day, just ten days out.
It did not matter. A hundred groups came through in that window, driving in from Gore, Invercargill, Wanaka and Alexandra.
“They had all heard about us already, and they all loved Te Radar,” Bryce says, referring to HouseMe’s long-running partnership with the rural media personality and MC. Most were after the same thing, a minor dwelling, and orders are already flowing through.
Backyards as investment
Regional New Zealand’s renewed confidence is showing up in more than tractor sales.
HouseMe is the principal sponsor of this year’s New Zealand Property Investors Federation conference, with Bryce a keynote speaker.
“The property investor space is clearly a bit more active,” Bryce says. HouseMe’s no-deposit finance offer has helped too, with higher lending limits now supporting around 100 to 120 finance-backed orders a year.
Earlier in the year, the government’s minor dwelling reform did some of HouseMe’s awareness work before the company spent a dollar on it. The reform had its limitations, and HouseMe chose not to take that route, but “it was a massive foot traffic and lead generation tool,” Bryce says.
“Once you peel back the onion, it’s not as good as everyone thought. But it coached people into thinking about minor dwellings on their own property, and once they’re through the door, we can educate them on what’s possible.” Demand has not slowed.
On the other side of that door is a mix of motivations. Some want extra accommodation for family: ageing parents moving closer, adult children needing a start. Others treat a HouseMe unit as an investment, a long-term rental or an Airbnb, income from land they already own.
Building smarter
Behind the sales numbers, HouseMe has been quietly removing friction from its own supply chain. From 5 August, it launches Easy Pile, a concreteless screw pile foundation system it now installs in-house rather than relying on a subcontracted network.
“It removes one of the most frustrating parts of the purchasing process,” Bryce says.
Foundations have traditionally meant geotech reports, drafting and a wait on an outside contractor, “the part that boggles the customer.”
With its own crew, HouseMe expects to complete around 200 installs a year.
It is the kind of unglamorous change that doesn’t make headlines, but it is exactly what a company punching above its weight needs: fewer variables between order and keys in hand.
HouseMe is also testing a bigger idea. Its 110 square metre modular home is being trialled on two sites, Waiuku and Waipawa in Central Hawke’s Bay, chosen to test the model across different councils.
Rather than sell the larger units at retail, Bryce sees the opportunity in partnering with landowners. “You’ve got the land, we’ve got the house. Let’s do a deal and make it happen.” It is early and resource-hungry, but the intent is clear.
Backing itself
None of this works without a brand that regional New Zealand actually trusts. The Toyota Corolla comparison Bryce has used since HouseMe first featured in The Profit still holds: affordable, reliable, no frills.
Another highlight for Bryce was taking that line literally. HouseMe gave away an actual Corolla, one of the moments he is proudest of in the business so far (see the giveaway story, this issue).
It’s a fitting shorthand for the whole HouseMe story this year: a straight-talking product finding its people in a straight-talking part of the country, right when that part of the country started spending again.
www.houseme.co.nz
The house that came with a free Corolla
HouseMe has long likened itself to a Toyota Corolla: affordable, reliable, something everyone knows. So when the team wanted a prize to thank its customers, it picked itself.
“Tim and I were having a coffee one day and I said, why don’t we just give away a Corolla?” says HouseMe’s Bryce Glover.
For Karen Franklin and her husband, the car was an afterthought. They settled on a HouseMe home the day before the competition closed.
“I said, we’ve got nothing to lose. Let’s do it,” she says. Then they forgot all about it.
The reminder came as a missed call from an unfamiliar number. By the time Karen called back, Bryce was boarding a plane and promised to ring Monday, leaving the family guessing all weekend. “The detective in me was going, have we won?”
They had. The home was for Karen’s father-in-law, Neville Franklin, who moved from Dargaville to a lifestyle property to be closer to family. He drew the Corolla, handy for a man who arrived with no car at all.
“He’s absolutely loving the Hawke’s Bay, and he loves his house. It’s perfect,” Karen says.
“The whole process was amazing.”
