Wolumla sub-division wrangles leave Gavin in a caravan for 33 months

Wanting to be closer to his family in Canberra, Mr Law sold his home near Port Macquarie in 2021 and visited the South Coast with his son looking for a new home.

"We came across the Wolumla development and thought beauty, nice-sized blocks, out in the country and a reasonable price," Mr Law said.

He said the development would have attracted a wide range of buyers including young families.

The development is the first of five stages of development in Wolumla which aims to increase housing stock.

"I spoke with the real estate agents in July 2021 and they said it would be finished by February/March 2022 and I'd be in my home for Christmas 2022."

He said all major works were completed by late 2022 but couldn't understand why nothing had moved since. On Thursday he parked his caravan on his block to highlight the dilemma.

The sub-division of 45 blocks, has yet to be approved by Bega Valley Shire Council who said the timing was down to the developer.

Emily Harrison, director community, environment and planning at council said the subdivision development remained under construction by the developer and all enquiries as to timing of completion of the subdivision works should be directed to the vendor.

Council had recently come under fire from Justice Fox Property Group CEO Benn Lane but had vigorously defended its position saying the criticism was unacceptable as a critical shortage of town planners and development engineers was being experienced at the same time as the number of DAs being submitted had significantly increased.

ACM understands there are still four or five matters to be resolved in the Wolumla stage 1 development including agreement on the amount to be held in a bond by council for residual works, should they be needed.

However a major issue has been a Telstra optical fibre line through the property.

Mr Law said originally there was talk of the line being needed for the NBN but the very obvious line-of-sight tower nearby meant that fibre wasn't going to be used.

But ACM understands Telstra wanted the fibre as a back-up and the discussions resulted in a "very painful process" that took considerable time.

Mr Law said he was aware of one buyer who had taken out a loan to cover the cost of the land and associated earthworks and had been making repayments since 2021.

He said once the sub-division was completed, he would get title documents and could submit the plans to council for his home.

Mr Law said he was told council would need three to five months to approve the home and the builders would need five months for construction.

The blocks are all fully serviced, with electricity, water and sewer connections available. Street lighting and kerb and guttering has been installed too.

There have been suggestions that the sub-division could be approved "well inside six months".

"It would be lovely to be sitting here in my own porch, at Christmas with a glass of red wine, looking out at the view," Mr Law said his hand sweeping across the hills he will face.

But at this stage he's not really certain, given the time it's taken so far.

If he manages it, it will have taken him three years from deposit to crossing his threshold.