Last updated 12:48, June 8 2018
ANDY JACKSON/STUFF
The St John the Divine Anglican Church in Otakeho, South Taranaki, attracted six offers.
The St John the Divine Anglican Church in Otakeho, South Taranaki, attracted six offers.
Tender offers on a historic South Taranaki church have closed with six parties - many with different plans for the holy building - vying for ownership.
The St John the Divine Anglican Church, at Otakeho, near Manaia, went on the market in May with bids for the category 2 historic building closing last Thursday.
Viv Scott, of McDonalds Real Estate, Opunake, said about 30 tender documents had been sent out to would-be buyers with six making offers.
The exterior of St John the Divine Anglican Church in Otakeho, South Taranaki.
The church, which was built in 1894 for £500 but was expected to exceed its $74,000 rateable valuation, garnered a flurry of interest following four open homes.
"We knew it was going to be huge," she said.
The rimu interior of St John's Anglican Church in Otakeho, coastal Taranaki.
The realtor, who has sold two previous churches, which became a second hand store and a wedding venue, was happy with the results but not surprised by the interest.
"Everybody wants to own a church."
The offers were currently with the Anglican Trust Board, which would decide on the successful tender, but Scott said it may not come down to the best dollar figure put forward.
"It's not necessarily about the money it's about what's going to happen with the church."
Scott said many of the parties to make offers had varying plans, with a few wanting to have it for a home conversion, another wanting to relocate it for a wedding venue and another planning to transform it into a retreat.
"We also had somebody else wanting it for a refuge for mothers and children."
Scott was unsure when the Board was due to meet to make its decision.
The church, which sits on an acre of land beside Surf Highway 45, is the oldest on the Waimate Plains, and contained several memorials dedicated to local families, notably le Fleming, and Young, who had farmed the district.
Some of the memorials included an organ donated in 1916, a stained glass window, a baptismal font, a lectern, and a framed poem dedicated to the church by Sam Hunt, are among the list of excluded chattels, which may remain with the new owners.
Minor repairs would be required to brace a wall which had slipped off the piles if the building was located elsewhere, an engineer's report showed.