Fencing a new build in Pakenham East.
The order to do it in, what your title covenant has already decided for you, how to get the vacant block next door to pay its half, and what 60 metres of Colorbond actually costs on a standard corridor lot.
Get the order right and the rest is easy.
Pakenham East is one of the largest new residential precincts in Cardinia Shire, planned for thousands of dwellings, and it is landing on top of an existing corridor that already includes Cardinia Lakes, Lakeside, Heritage Springs and the fast-filling estates through Officer. We fence a lot of these lots, and almost every problem we see comes down to sequence rather than product.
The right order is: handover, then retaining walls and driveway, then fencing, then landscaping. Each step is there for a reason.
Handover first, because until then it is the builder's site. Their trades need access down both sides, and a fence standing in the way of somebody who has a job to finish will be moved, cut or damaged. We can and occasionally do fence a side boundary pre-handover where that side is finished and access is genuinely clear, but we will tell you honestly when it is not worth it. What we would rather do is quote it now and book the install for the fortnight after you collect the keys.
Retaining and driveway before fencing, because on a cut-and-fill estate lot the retaining wall determines where the fence line physically sits and at what level. Get this backwards and the fence gets rebuilt. Related, and important: on these lots the line between a fence with a plinth and a retaining structure is thinner than people think. The moment a fence holds back soil it is structural, it needs a VBA-registered practitioner and often engineering, and it needs a building permit. That is a much more common situation on a cut-and-fill lot than owners expect.
Fencing before landscaping, for the plainest reason on this page: we need to get a hydraulic post-hole borer down the side of your house, and neither of us wants that machine tracking across new turf. Fencing first also means your landscaper can set bed levels to the finished fence rather than guessing. And it lets them keep the mulch off the sheet, which is a warranty condition on Colorbond that raised-bed builds break constantly.
Your covenant has probably already chosen the fence.
Before you spend an evening comparing colours, read your title. Most lots across the Pakenham East precinct and the established corridor estates carry a Memorandum of Common Provisions or developer design guidelines, and these are not suggestions in a brochure. They are registered on the title and enforceable, by the developer and in many cases by your neighbours.
The typical terms read something like: 1.8 metre Colorbond to side and rear boundaries in a nominated colour, commonly Woodland Grey or Basalt; a front fence either prohibited outright or capped at about 1.2 metres in an open style; and on a corner lot, a mandatory return fence with a specified setback from the street. Some estates go further and nominate the post spacing or ban timber entirely. If your MCP says Woodland Grey, then the whole Colorbond versus timber comparison is academic for you, and it is better to know that before you get emotionally attached to hardwood.
There is a silver lining in the covenant, and it is financial. Under the Fences Act 1968 a neighbour's contribution is normally capped at the cost of a sufficient fence, which in most Victorian streets means a paling fence, so an owner who wants Colorbond usually pays the difference themselves. But where a registered covenant mandates Colorbond for that street, Colorbond is arguably the sufficient fence for that location, and the cost-share is calculated on Colorbond rather than on paling. On a 60 metre lot that difference is worth several hundred dollars. Our page on the Fences Act in Pakenham runs through the notice process.
Permits. For a standard 1.8m Colorbond side and rear, none. Under the Building Regulations 2018, most domestic fences under 2 metres need no building permit. You do need one over 2 metres, on a designated corner splay where sightline provisions apply, and for anything retaining. A pool barrier is a separate regime again: registered with Cardinia Shire, inspected against AS 1926.1, re-certified every four years, and compliant before the pool holds water regardless of what else on the site is unfinished. See AS 1926.1 barriers in Pakenham and our pool safety fencing page.
The vacant block next door, and what 60 metres costs.
The most common question we get on a new estate lot: the block next door is bare dirt, so do I just pay for the whole fence? No. The registered owner of that vacant lot is your neighbour under the Fences Act 1968 whether they have built yet or not, whether they are a builder, a developer, an investor or somebody who has not turned a sod. You do a title search, you find the registered owner, you serve a Fence Notice on them with your quote attached, and they are liable for half of a sufficient fence exactly as an occupied neighbour would be.
In practice, developers and volume builders often pay without a fight, because they deal with this constantly and have a process for it. Investors sometimes need the notice served properly before they engage. If the owner genuinely cannot be located, the Act does allow you to proceed and recover later, but that is the point at which you want advice rather than a fencing contractor's opinion. Free mediation is available through the Dispute Settlement Centre of Victoria. What we can do is write the quote in the form the notice process needs, and we do that whether or not you end up building with us.
The worked example. Take a typical corridor lot: 12.5 metre frontage, 32 metres deep. Fenced boundaries are the 12.5 metre rear plus two side returns of about 24 metres each running back from the house line. That is 60.5 metres total. At $135 per metre for 1.8m Colorbond fencing in the covenant colour, that is $8,168 including GST. On a brand new lot there is no demolition, which is the one genuine saving of a new build over a replacement.
Now the cost-share. Every one of those 60.5 metres is a dividing fence with a neighbour, so on a sufficient-fence basis your share is about $4,084 and the three adjoining owners between them carry the other half. That is the number to have in your head: not eight thousand, roughly four. The catch is timing, because you only get it if you serve notices rather than just building the fence and hoping. Owners who build first and ask later routinely recover nothing, and that is the single most expensive mistake made on these estates.
One build note specific to these lots. Pakenham East and the corridor estates are open, exposed ground, and most classify N3 under AS 4055 with a 50m/s design gust, some fringe lots N4. The 600mm post depth that builder-grade fencing defaults to does not hold that load on reactive H1 or H2 clay. We go to 750mm minimum and 900mm on runs facing the prevailing south-westerly, which on most of these lots is the rear boundary. The reasoning is on our post depth page. It costs roughly $400-600 more across a lot this size and it is the difference between one fence and two.
New estates we fence.
Frequently asked: new build fencing in Pakenham East.
When should I fence a new Pakenham East build?
After handover, and after retaining walls and the driveway, but before you landscape. Builders regularly change finished ground levels between practical completion and final site clean, and a fence set to the wrong level either buries its bottom rail or leaves a gap you cannot close. Retaining walls dictate where the fence line sits on a cut-and-fill lot. And fencing before landscaping means we can bring a borer down the side without driving over new turf. The exception is a pool barrier, which must be compliant before the pool holds water.
Who pays for the fence if the block next door in Pakenham East is still vacant?
The registered owner of that vacant lot is still your neighbour under the Fences Act 1968, whether they are a builder, developer, investor or someone who has not started. Do a title search, serve a Fence Notice on the registered owner with your quote attached, and they are liable for half of a sufficient fence exactly as an occupied neighbour would be. Developers and volume builders often pay without a fight because they have a process. If the owner cannot be located the Act lets you proceed and recover later, but get advice first.
Does my estate covenant control the fence colour in Pakenham East?
Very often yes, and it is on your title, not in a brochure. Most lots across the precinct and the corridor estates carry a Memorandum of Common Provisions or design guidelines specifying fence type, height and frequently the exact Colorbond colour, with extra rules for corner lots and street-visible boundaries. Typical terms: 1.8m Colorbond to side and rear in a nominated colour, a front fence capped around 1.2m in an open style or banned, and a mandatory corner return. Read the MCP first, because it is enforceable.
Do I need a permit for a fence on a new Cardinia estate?
For a standard 1.8m Colorbond side and rear, no. Under the Building Regulations 2018 most domestic fences under 2 metres need no building permit. You do need one over 2 metres, on a designated corner splay where sightline provisions apply, and for anything that retains soil, which on a cut-and-fill estate lot happens far more often than people expect. A pool barrier is separate: registered with Cardinia Shire, inspected against AS 1926.1, re-certified every four years.
Can you fence a new build before handover?
Technically yes, and we sometimes do on a finished side boundary with clear access, but we usually advise against it. Until handover the site is the builder’s, their trades need both sides, and a fence in the way gets moved or damaged by someone with a job to finish. Ground levels are not final until the site clean. Better: we quote it now and install the fortnight after you get the keys, so the site has stopped moving.
Quote it now, build it after handover.
Send us your lot plan and your MCP and we will price it to the covenant and write the quote in the form you need to serve a Fence Notice on the block next door.