Quick answer
The trick with a Kāinga Ora development is that you are not building forty kitchens, you are building four types ten times over. Approve three or four kitchen types, fix each spec once, check-measure after building consent, then stage manufacture to the build sequence. The cooker, rangehood and fridge come through KO's nominated package and install by others.
Key points
- Repetition is the asset: three or four approved kitchen types cover a whole development, so you price and build the same thing many times instead of a new kitchen per lot.
- Fix each type's spec once, in writing, and every unit that calls that type prices and builds identically with no per-lot decisions.
- Check-measure happens after building consent and after the shell is lined and floored, not off the resource-consent drawings.
- Manufacture is staged to the build sequence block by block, so kitchens land as each block is ready rather than all at once into a yard.
- The cooker, rangehood and fridge are supplied and installed by others under KO's nominated appliance package, so they sit outside the kitchen sub's scope.
Forty units, four kitchens.
Forty units on a Kāinga Ora site in Mount Roskill, and the drawings show forty kitchens. They are not forty kitchens. They are a Type A galley, a Type B L-shape, a Type C two-bed and a Type D accessible, each repeated ten or so times across the lots. The job gets simpler and cheaper the moment you stop treating every lot as its own design and start treating it as four kitchens built on repeat.
Programme certainty on a KO development comes from that repetition, if you set it up properly. Fix the types, fix the spec, measure at the right moment, and stage the build so the kitchen is never the trade holding up a block. Here is how the pieces fit, and where the appliance scope actually sits, because that last one catches contractors out more than anything else.
Reduce forty kitchens to four types
KO developments repeat unit types by design. The same one-bed, two-bed and accessible plans turn up across a site, and your kitchen types should map straight onto them. Agree the set early, A through D, and get each one approved once against the KO design requirements. After that, every lot references a type instead of carrying its own drawing, and the whole package collapses from forty problems to four. The detail behind each type is in meeting the Kāinga Ora kitchen design requirements, and the sizing logic sits in standard kitchen sizes and layouts for NZ townhouse developments.
The discipline is resisting the special. A site manager will ask for a small change on one lot because the plumbing is offset or a wall moved, and if you let each of those become a bespoke kitchen you have lost the whole advantage. Most of those are handled by an install-day adjustment against a fixed type, not a new type. Keep the type count to three or four and hold the line.
Fix the spec once, price it once
Each type gets one approved spec sheet: cabinets, benchtop, sink bench, edging, hardware, catches, colours, all locked and version-controlled. That sheet is the single source for the whole development. Every unit of that type is built to it, priced to it and measured against it, which is how you get thirty identical kitchens instead of thirty slightly different ones. It also kills the per-lot RFI, because there is nothing left to ask: the answer is the spec sheet.
Pricing follows the same logic. One rate per type against the Schedule of Rates, priced once and repeated, so your claim is arithmetic and your margin is visible on every unit. That is set out in pricing kitchens to the Kāinga Ora Schedule of Rates, and the wider budgeting in budgeting kitchens across a multi-unit development. Fixing the spec once is also the single biggest lever on reducing variations and RFIs across the package.
Check-measure after building consent, not off the plans
The measure that matters is taken on site, after building consent, once the shell is built, lined and floored. Not off the resource-consent drawings, and not off the plans that won the tender. A GIB-lined room is never exactly the drawing, and benchtops in particular template off the as-built cabinetry, not a number on a page. Measure off the plan and you get a kitchen that fits the drawing and fights the room, which is the whole point of site measure versus plan measure.
Timing is the trick on a staged job. You cannot check-measure a block that is not lined yet, but you do not wait for all forty units either. You measure block by block as each one reaches lock-up and lining, so the measure for Block 1 happens while Block 3 is still framing. The type is fixed, so the measure is a confirmation, not a redesign: you are checking the room matches the type, and picking up the real dimensions for the cut, not deciding anything new.
Stage manufacture to the build sequence
Do not make forty kitchens and stack them in a yard. Stored kitchens get damaged, they tie up cash, and they need space nobody costed. Manufacture is staged to the construction programme instead: Block 1's kitchens are built while Block 1 finishes its linings and Block 2 is still framing, then Block 2 follows as it catches up. At ten-plus kitchens a week of workshop capacity, the kitchen tracks the build rather than leading or lagging it, and it never becomes the reason a block waits for handover.
Made block by block, not all at once.
| Block | Build state | Kitchen action |
|---|---|---|
| Block 1 | Lined and floored | Check-measure, manufacture, install |
| Block 2 | Framing to linings | Types confirmed, in the manufacturing queue |
| Block 3 | Foundations to framing | Spec locked, not yet measured |
| Block 4 | Site works | Type allocation only |
That staging is what turns a scary-looking number of units into a rolling programme. A twenty-unit run from a locked spec is roughly two production cycles through the workshop and a rolling install behind it, laid out in how long it takes to supply kitchens for a 20-unit development. Keeping the kitchen off the critical path is the same discipline as any build, covered in kitchen lead times and your construction programme.
The appliances are not the kitchen's scope
This is the one that catches contractors out. On KO work the cooker, the rangehood and the fridge are usually a nominated appliance package: KO's chosen supplier provides them, and they are installed by others, not by the kitchen sub. The kitchen sub supplies and installs the cabinetry, the benchtop and the stainless sink bench, and leaves the right spaces and services for the appliances to land in. Get that boundary wrong in your scope and you either double-buy appliances or find nobody ordered them.
- The oven and hob space is left to size, with the electrical or gas point provided by others.
- The rangehood position and its ducting and electrical are set out, but the unit itself comes through the nominated package.
- The fridge space is left open on one side with a socket close by, sized for whatever fridge the tenant brings.
- The kitchen quote excludes the cooker, rangehood and fridge, so they are not priced twice or assumed in.
The coordination that is left is real, though. The kitchen sub, the electrician and the appliance installer all touch the same three spaces, so the sequence has to be right: cabinetry and services in, then appliances landed and connected. Leave the fridge space open per the design requirements, leave the rangehood position clear, and make sure the socket and the point are where the appliance installer expects them. Get the sequence wrong and the appliances turn up before the kitchen is ready to take them.
The kitchens were easy. It was the fridge nobody ordered, because everyone thought it was in someone else's scope, that held up the block. Write the appliance line into the contract and you never have that week.
What goes wrong
The failures on a repeated-kitchen development are rarely about the kitchens themselves. They come from letting the repetition break down, or from measuring and staging at the wrong moment.
- The type count creeps: a special on this lot, a change on that one, and suddenly you are building forty bespoke kitchens again.
- The spec sheet is not version-controlled, so half the site gets built to an old detail after a change.
- Kitchens are manufactured off the consent drawings to save time, then arrive a few millimetres out on every unit.
- Everything is made up front and stacked in a yard, where it gets damaged and ties up cash.
- The measure is taken before the block is lined, so it is wrong, or after handover pressure builds, so it is rushed.
- The appliance scope is unclear, so the cooker, rangehood or fridge is double-ordered or never ordered.
What to lock before the first block
- The set of kitchen types, three or four, each approved once against the KO design requirements.
- A version-controlled spec sheet per type, priced once against the Schedule of Rates.
- The check-measure timing agreed: after consent, after lining, block by block.
- The manufacture staged to the construction programme, not made all at once.
- The appliance scope written down: cabinetry and sink by the kitchen sub, cooker, rangehood and fridge by others.
- The trade sequence for the appliance spaces, so the kitchen, the electrician and the appliance installer are not tripping over each other.
Send the types and the programme
A repeated-kitchen development is not a hard job. It is a well-organised one. Fix three or four types, lock each spec once, measure block by block off the as-built shell, and stage the manufacture to the build so the kitchen is never the trade holding up a handover. Keep the appliance line clean in the scope and the whole package runs on rails instead of on phone calls.
MTN Kitchens runs its own East Tāmaki workshop, 23 years, 2,000-plus kitchens, ten-plus a week, Site Safe qualified, supply and install under one contract and one invoice. That capacity is what lets us stage a development to your programme instead of yours flexing around ours. Send the unit types, the lot count and the build sequence, and a trade-priced package comes back inside 24 hours, plus GST, with the appliance scope drawn where KO puts it. The pricing detail is in pricing kitchens to the Kāinga Ora Schedule of Rates and the compliance detail in meeting the Kāinga Ora kitchen design requirements.
Frequently asked questions
How many kitchen types should a KO development have?
Usually three or four covers a development, mapped to the repeating unit types: a galley, an L-shape, a larger two-bed and an accessible layout. The aim is the smallest set that fits the plans, because every extra type is another spec to approve, price and manage. Keep the count low and hold it, treating most one-off differences as an install-day adjustment against a fixed type rather than a new type. Fewer types means more repetition, and repetition is what makes the programme certain.
When should kitchens be check-measured on a staged development?
After building consent and after each block's shell is built, lined and floored, block by block as they reach that state. Not off the resource-consent drawings, and not all at once at the start. A lined room is never exactly the drawing, and benchtops template off the as-built cabinetry, so a measure taken too early is wrong and one taken under handover pressure is rushed. Because the type is fixed, the measure is a confirmation of the room, not a redesign.
Are the appliances included in the kitchen contract on a KO job?
Usually not. The cooker, rangehood and fridge are commonly a Kāinga Ora nominated appliance package, supplied by KO's chosen supplier and installed by others, not by the kitchen sub. The kitchen sub supplies and installs the cabinetry, benchtop and stainless sink bench, and leaves the spaces and services for the appliances. Confirm it against your own contract, and write the boundary into the kitchen scope so the appliances are neither double-ordered nor forgotten.
What happens if the unit types change after we've locked the kitchen spec?
The version-controlled spec sheet is what saves you. When a type genuinely changes, its spec sheet version ticks over with a date, and everyone works to the new one from that point, so you never end up with half the site built to a superseded detail. A real change to a type is fine if it is managed that way. What hurts is an unmanaged change, or a string of one-off specials that quietly turn a four-type job back into forty bespoke kitchens.
Can you manufacture and install block by block instead of all at once?
Yes, and it is the better way to run it. Manufacture is staged to the construction programme, so each block's kitchens are built as that block reaches lining and lock-up, then installed behind the flooring and stopping. With ten-plus kitchens a week of workshop capacity, the kitchen tracks the build rather than leading or lagging it. That avoids making forty kitchens up front, storing them, and having them damaged or tying up cash before the block is ready.