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Property · Click a point

Select a New Zealand property boundary for terrain analysis

This property boundary map loads the legal parcel under your click from the LINZ cadastre, anywhere in New Zealand, and uses it as the analysis area for every other tool. Contours, slope, drainage, winter sun and the property report are then clipped to the title rather than a rectangle drawn by eye.

It is the starting point for most jobs on this site: find the section by address or appellation, select it, then pick the question you want answered.

The Mt Iron reserve parcel outlined in green with its appellation, title and area in the panel
Property on Mt Iron, Wānaka. The walkthrough below shows how this was made.

Free to run · pay to download

See the full result on the map free, with no account. Download the parcel boundaries as DXF, GeoJSON and KML, one feature per parcel with a pass: NZ$49 for 7 days or NZ$299 for 12 months, one-off, GST included, not a subscription. Every download on the site is included while the pass lasts.

Open Property on the map →Pass prices and what’s included

Who uses this

  • Buyers. Measure the block they are actually buying, not the paddock next door.
  • Architects and designers. Start a site analysis from the real boundary and appellation.
  • Real estate agents. Pull terrain facts for a listing parcel in a couple of clicks.

When to use it

  • You want contours, slope, sunlight or drainage clipped to a title rather than a rectangle drawn by eye.
  • You are comparing several properties and want each one measured on the same footing.
  • You need the parcel appellation, area and title reference alongside the terrain.

Which tool for your job

Property is one step in a bigger question. These are the jobs it helps with, and the tools that go with it.

If you’re working on buying a section or lifestyle block

What is the ground like, and how does it compare with the others on my list?

  1. 1.Property (this tool) — Selects the legal parcel so every other tool is clipped to the boundary.
  2. 2.Property Report — A PDF with contours, slope, aspect, winter sun, drainage, elevation and old aerial photos for that parcel, or several selected together.
  3. 3.Saved Properties — Up to five places side by side: elevation, slope, winter sun and drainage.
  4. 4.Flow Paths — Where water will run and pond across the block in heavy rain.
  5. 5.Aerial History — Old aerial photos back to the 1930s in places: past slips, filled gullies and streams that have since gone.
  6. 6.Elevation Change — Where LiDAR was flown twice: whether the ground has slipped, been filled or been cut since.

How to use it

  1. Open Property and zoom in until parcel outlines appear on the map.
  2. Click inside the parcel. The boundary is fetched and drawn as the analysis area.
  3. Search an address or appellation in the top bar to jump straight to a parcel instead of clicking.
  4. To take several parcels, Shift-click each one (Ctrl-click also works, or ⌘-click on a Mac), or turn on Add another parcel (handy on a phone). Click a selected parcel again to drop it. Select parcels in a box takes every parcel a box touches, roads left out. Up to 25 parcels at once.
  5. Switch to any area tool. Its results are clipped to the parcel until you clear or redraw the area.

Step by step: Mt Iron, Wānaka

We select the Mt Iron recreation reserve, a 67 ha parcel on the eastern edge of Wānaka, so that later tools measure only the reserve.

The Property tool open over Mt Iron, asking for a click on the map
1.Open Property from the rail and zoom in until you can see the ground you want. The panel asks for a click.
The Mt Iron reserve parcel outlined in green with its appellation, title and area in the panel
2.One click inside the reserve fetches its boundary from the LINZ cadastre: Section 3 SO 573783, 66.91 ha, Otago land district. The outline is now the analysis area for every other tool.

What it showed

  • The boundary follows the surveyed parcel, which here includes a long strip along the road that you would never draw by eye.
  • Switch to Slope, Sunlight or Flow Paths next. Each one is clipped to this outline until you clear it.

Screenshots from NZ Elevation Tools. Aerial imagery from LINZ Basemaps. Sourced from the LINZ Data Service and licensed by Environment Southland, Otago Regional Council and Queenstown-Lakes District Council for re-use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.

Try it on Mt Iron, Wānaka →

How it works

The click is sent to the LINZ cadastral service, which returns the parcel polygon and its attributes. Where a live title is available the title boundary is used, since a title can span several parcels.

The polygon becomes a cookie cutter: terrain is loaded for the bounding box, and every tool masks its result to the polygon so nothing outside the boundary is counted.

Several parcels are merged into one area: neighbours join up and separate parcels stay separate, so tools measure all of them and nothing in between. Files from the Download tool still cover one box around them all.

Reading the results

The panel lists the appellation, calculated area, land district and any title references the cadastre holds for the parcel. With several parcels it lists each one with its area, and the total.

Downloads from the other tools carry the parcel name in their metadata.

With a pass, download the boundary itself: DXF in NZTM2000 metres for CAD, or GeoJSON and KML in WGS84. Several parcels go in one file, each its own feature with its own details. Each file names its source and export date.

Limits and warnings

  • Boundaries are LINZ's mapped cadastre, not legal survey evidence. LINZ states a nominal accuracy of 0.1–1 m in urban areas and 1–100 m in rural areas, and lines can sit away from fences and hedges on the ground.
  • Very large rural parcels may exceed a tool's area limit. The tool will say so; draw a smaller area inside the parcel instead.
  • The parcel service is a live LINZ feed. If it is unavailable the click does nothing and the panel reports the error.

Data and attribution

The parcel boundary comes from the LINZ cadastre (NZ Primary Parcels, and the title where LINZ holds one), looked up through our server. Property itself reads no heights; the tool you run next on the boundary does.

Elevation and cadastral data is sourced from the LINZ Data Service and licensed for re-use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. Copyright in each LiDAR survey belongs to the body that commissioned it — a regional or district council, Waka Kotahi, NIWA and around thirty others — rather than to LINZ, which hosts and processes the national dataset. Every file exported from this site names the licensors whose surveys cover the area, and anything you publish from those files carries the same attribution requirement. See https://www.linz.govt.nz/products-services/data/licensing-and-using-data/attributing-elevation-or-aerial-imagery-data

Questions

Are the boundaries survey accurate?

No. They are LINZ's mapped cadastral boundaries, with a stated nominal accuracy of 0.1–1 m in urban areas and 1–100 m in rural areas, and they can sit away from fences and hedges on the ground. For a boundary dispute or a building setback you need a licensed cadastral surveyor.

Can I select more than one parcel?

Yes, up to 25. Shift-click each parcel, turn on Add another parcel, or select every parcel in a box. The tools then analyse them together as one area.

Can I search by address or legal description?

Yes. The search bar takes a street address, a place name or a parcel appellation such as "Lot 2 DP 12345", and jumps to the parcel.

Ready to try it?

Open Property on the map →

Free to use, no account. The parcel lookup and the boundary files run on our server, on LINZ open data. Downloading the results needs a pass: see prices.

Missing something you need? Suggest a feature or ask about custom work.