Greenest Suburbs in New Zealand

The quarter-acre section was the original New Zealand promise, and its quiet disappearance is the reason green space now has to be ranked at all. These are the suburbs with the most of it within reach: parks, reserves, bush, the town belt if you're lucky, the parts of the map nobody has managed to build on yet.

Green space is the amenity every New Zealander says they want and almost nobody checks before buying, which is how you end up with a trampoline on a lawn the size of a beach towel and a "park" that turns out to be a stormwater detention pond with a bench. The data here counts what's actually on the ground, not what the subdivision brochure rendered in watercolour with a family of four and a golden retriever.

One warning. The leafiest suburbs know exactly how leafy they are and price accordingly, the tūī do not come free. But a few places on this list have the trees without the premium attached, and they're worth a look before the next person notices.