Country singer shifts dream from Nashville, Tennessee, to tiny South Island town

She’s been on stage opening for Kenny Rogers, he’s kayaked some of the gnarliest whitewater in the world, and together they’ve found their home in a tiny town on the South Island’s West Coast.

Country singer Jody Direen was “always on the road”, travelling a lot back and forth between New Zealand, Australia and the US, when she began to feel a longing to put down roots.

In mid-2019, she started looking to Franz Josef in South Westland, population less than 500, drawn not only by its openness to nature, but also by the affordability of housing.

“I was very drawn to the energy of the area. You kind of feel like you’re on beach time,” Direen says. “But also, I was thinking I would really love to own my own home.

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“With property prices in other parts of New Zealand, well as a solo musician, the bank didn’t like me very much, they didn’t see it as a reliable income.”

She saw that she could buy a house with “a decent amount of land”, complete with lake and mountain views, for a fraction of what she would need to pay elsewhere, including in her home town, Wānaka.

Direen says she had fallen in love with the solitude of the West Coast 10 years earlier when a former partner took her on trips whitebaiting to his stand on the Paringa River.

“There was something mystical and magical about it,” she says.

“It does surprise a lot of people that I made the decision to base myself here,” Direen says. “But I’ve always been one to follow my heart. I wanted to live life on my terms.”

She soon met Barny Young, a world-travelling extreme kayaker, who had based himself in Franz Josef too, in no small part because of the fantastic outdoors opportunities the region offers someone like himself.

They started dating, and six months later, Direen, now 33, and Young, 36, bought 30 acres (12 hectares) of land where they’re building a home.

Direen says property is still affordable on the West Coast – a section the size of theirs can be obtained for less than $300,000.

“Here we can have property, our dream careers, as well as money in the bank to go play.”

They manage to fund their lifestyle through a variety of ventures. Together, they own e-commerce business Packraft New Zealand, selling the lightweight single-person rafts, and shipping from Franz Josef.

Young, a PE teacher by training, also works as a learning support coordinator at the local high schools.

Direen, who has recorded four albums, pivoted to digital marketing during the pandemic, helping local tourism businesses. She plans to continue that work, while also ratcheting back up her performing career, currently lining up dates for the summer music festival season.

And when she needs to travel overseas to perform – as she did last month performing at North Queensland’s Rock’n Country Music Festival – she says it’s only a 20-minute flight from Hokitika to Christchurch International Airport.

Alternatively, Queenstown Airport is a four-hour drive away.

The Tui-award winning artist did a stint basing herself in Nashville, Tennessee, in the mid 2010s, during which time she was under the management of Bear Grylls Ventures talent management company.

But visa problems, and the call of home, brought her back to Aotearoa.

”There would be a benefit to living in Sydney or Nashville,” she says. “But life is about meeting all of your needs, and I’m not happy living in a city.

“To be my most authentic self, which is important when you’re making music, I need to be in a place where music is balanced with outdoor adventure and being in nature, not being surrounded by a tonne of people and traffic.”

Direen says she loves the region so much she wants to “share it with the world”:

“There’s so much opportunity here. I just pinch myself every day. I say this to a lot of people – friends who are struggling, some with young families who just want to get ahead, to get into their own home.”

She’s aware it won’t suit everyone, however.

“You do have to have a love for outdoor adventure on the West Coast, and for nature because it’s such a huge part of the lifestyle and living here.

“It would suit entrepreneurial people who love hiking, hunting, the ocean, fishing, skiing – that adventure sports lifestyle.”