Peter Thiel’s Planned New Zealand Mega-Estate Hits Big Snag
It was a cake walk for Peter Thiel to secure New Zealand citizenship in 2011, even though he had spent just 12 days in the country over the preceding five years. (Typical applicants must have spent 1,350.) Now, with aspirations of building a 477-acre mega-estate on the South Island, authorities aren’t making things so easy.
On Tuesday local time, Queenstown Lakes District senior planner Sarah Gathercole dropped a 978-report on his proposed ten-bedroom oasis, which reportedly would include a “meditation pod, library, theater lounge and spa rooms.”
Citing “adverse effects” on the local environment, she recommended that the billionaire’s plan be shot down.