Building Act 2004

Building - Restricted building work carried out by owner-builders

90D: Owner-builder exemption

You could also call this:

"Building your own home: when you don't need a licensed builder"

You can do restricted building work without a licensed building practitioner if you are an owner-builder. You must own the land and do the work yourself. There are some exceptions to this rule. You cannot do this if the work is for a small stand-alone dwelling that does not have a consent. There are also some types of building work where this rule does not apply, such as low-risk building work or commercial building work. These types of work have their own special rules. If you want to know more about the rules for owner-builders, you can check the Building Amendment Act 2012 or the Building and Construction (Small Stand-alone Dwellings) Amendment Act 2025. You can find more information about these laws on the legislation.govt.nz website. This will help you understand the rules and what you can and cannot do as an owner-builder.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM4357117.

This page was last updated on 5 February 2026 — View changes

Topics:

Housing and property > Buying and selling homesHousing and property > Home safety and repairsBusiness > Industry rules

90C: Meaning of relevant interest, or

"Explaining what counts as having an interest in a building or land for legal purposes"

91: Building consent authority that grants building consent to issue code compliance certificate, or

"The authority that gave you permission to build is usually the one to say it's done properly, but sometimes another authority can do it if everyone agrees."

Part 2Building
Restricted building work carried out by owner-builders

90DOwner-builder exemption

A person who is an owner-builder in relation to restricted building work may carry out that restricted building work without being supervised by a licensed building practitioner.
Subsection (1) does not apply to building work in connection with a non-consented small stand-alone dwelling.
Subsection (1) does not apply if the restricted building work in question is low-risk building work under a low-risk building consent, simple residential building work under a simple residential building consent, or commercial building work under a commercial building consent.

Notes

Section 90D: inserted, on 13 March 2012, by section 29 of the Building Amendment Act 2012 (2012 No 23).
Section 90D(1A): inserted, on 15 January 2026, by section 18 of the Building and Construction (Small Stand-alone Dwellings) Amendment Act 2025 (2025 No 59).