3,420 independent-living units and 260 serviced apartments
Company revenue
A$214m
Year to 30 June 2026; not-for-profit operator
A considered point of view.
Residents buy into a village in their seventies and expect it to serve them into their nineties. The land, the approval and the first sales campaign matter for a few years; the hospital, the general practice and the bus matter for decades. I would rather grow more slowly in towns that can keep that promise than quickly in places that look good in a feasibility study.
Selected leadership work / 01
Selling an approved coastal option I had once supported
In 2020, as general manager of development, I supported Kurrawind taking a two-year option over a 14-hectare site in a growing coastal town on the Mid North Coast.
I decide where our villages grow by asking whether the surrounding town will still serve a resident of eighty-five, not only whether the land can be approved.
I am chief strategy officer of Kurrawind Community Villages, a not-for-profit company without shareholders that has housed older people in regional New South Wales since 1974. From our Bathurst office we operate 27 villages with 3,420 independent-living units and 260 serviced apartments, home to about 4,900 residents. Revenue for the year to 30 June 2026 was A$214 million, and valuers put our investment property at A$1.66 billion. I lead a 14-person team covering strategy, planning approvals, resident research and capital partnerships. Construction, village management and resident contracts sit with other executives, and the board decides every acquisition and development.
I trained as a town planner and spent my first three years at a shire council in the Central West, assessing applications from farming couples moving into town. Later I prepared approvals, delivered estates, valued retirement villages and ran Kurrawind's development programme. That route left me with one habit. Before anyone discusses yield or approval risk, I ask how a resident would reach a doctor, an emergency department, a pharmacy and their family once they stop driving. Cheap land in a town without those things becomes a promise the town cannot help us keep.
Three decisions on this site show the method and its price. We let an approved coastal site go after I had supported buying the option. We brought a pension investor into three new villages and gave up half their development margin. We deferred a new stage to retrofit nine older villages for heat, energy and access. Each was contested by people whose concerns were reasonable, and I describe what we lost as plainly as what we gained.
An approval was not a reason to build
We spent A$3.9 million obtaining consent for 236 units on the Mid North Coast, then sold the option for A$2.6 million because the nearest emergency department was forty minutes away. The capital went into 112 inland units near regional hospitals.
A partner for new villages instead of selling old ones
In December 2023 our board approved a A$320 million joint venture with Corwennan Pension Trust for three villages. We kept every resident contract, and our share of 2026 development margin was A$8.7 million rather than about A$17 million.
Older homes renewed before new ones were added
A retrofit budgeted at A$46 million across nine villages built between 1979 and 1994 cut average resale time from 11.2 to 6.9 months in the six finished so far. Valuers recognised A$19 million of the A$31 million spent.
Current focus
I am preparing our ten-year plan for the board. It asks how many of the regional homes sought under Australia's housing-supply commitment can sensibly be homes for older people, and which towns can carry the services our residents will need.
Conversations I welcome
I am open to a first independent non-executive seat with a community housing provider, a regional infrastructure owner or a seniors-housing business that does not compete with Kurrawind, with about twenty-two days a year available once our chief executive and board have consented.
The leadership record
Trusted with consequential decisions.
In the boardroom
Kurrawind Corwennan Villages Pty LtdNominee director for Kurrawind · 2024–present
Formation
Bachelor of town planningTarravale University · 1995
Graduate diploma in property valuationWenmorrow College of Property Studies · 2009
Harrison brought the board a recommendation to sell a site he had once argued for, and he set out his earlier reasoning as fairly as his new case. We did not all agree, but every director understood exactly what we were choosing and what it would cost.
Bronwyn TalliskerChair, Kurrawind Community Villages LimitedThe full record ↗
Contact
I am open to a first independent non-executive seat with a community housing provider, a regional infrastructure owner or a seniors-housing business that does not compete with Kurrawind, with about twenty-two days a year available once our chief executive and board have consented.
