Frequently asked questions

The best place to start is to read about the purchasing process and then register your interest in becoming a Nightingale resident. We will email you whenever a new project launches. You can also follow us on Instagram to stay up-to-date about all things Nightingale.

Nightingale is driven by a triple-bottom-line approach that prioritises social, financial and environmental sustainability. Read more about our principles here. As a not-for-profit, Nightingale doesn’t add a profit margin, instead we delivery quality apartments ‘at cost’.

In 2021, Nightingale transitioned from a social enterprise to a not-for-profit organisation, which makes Nightingale somewhat of an outlier in the profit-driven property sector. Understandably, we’re asked a lot of questions about this. That’s why we published an explainer here that goes into all the details of our organisational structure, mission and strategy.

From the first information session until you can move into your new home will likely take between 2 and 3 years. You can read more about the purchasing process and timelines (further down that page) here.

The resale caveat on Nightingale apartments only restricts how you sell your apartment, not whether you can rent it out.

If you need to rent out your apartment, we encourage you to consider long-term rental periods to enable renters to become a part of the Nightingale community. We would also encourage you to set your maximum rent at 5% of your purchase price per annum.

Short-term rental arrangements through services like Airbnb or Stayz are discouraged, as these can be disruptive to the sense of community in the building.

We want to bring the Nightingale model to as many places as possible, but we can only develop sites where we can realise our mission. There is a sweet spot where density and land cost allows a project to deliver sustainable, high-quality housing at below-market prices.

While most of our projects are in Victoria, we also have upcoming and completed projects in Bowden SA, Brompton SA, Fremantle WA and Marrickville NSW.

Register as a future Nightingale resident to be informed of all our upcoming projects.

Nightingale currently builds homes to sell to owner-occupiers. The exception is our one-off build-to-rent project Nightingale Marrickville.

In each new project we aim to allocate a portion of homes as affordable rental properties. These tenancies are owned and managed by community housing providers such as Women's Property Initiatives, Aboriginal Housing Victoria, and Housing Choices Australia, not by Nightingale Housing.

Nightingale Housing aims to make 20% of homes in each project available to those most in need. We do this by partnering with community housing providers, who own and manage affordable rental properties.

In Victoria, some community housing providers including our partner Women's Property Initiatives require applicants to be on the Victorian Housing Register (VHR). You can find out more about the Register and apply for social housing at housing.vic.gov.au/apply-social-housing.

You can also contact Housing Choices Australia about affordable housing for people on low to moderate incomes, and for people living with disability.

We also partner with Aboriginal Housing Victoria.

Yes. Nightingale communities include people of all ages.

Nightingale homes are designed so that people can age in place: apartment configuration is informed by the Victorian Government’s Better Apartment Design Standards (BADS). The majority of Nightingale homes and shared spaces have flush transitions throughout, and are designed to an LHA silver standard (however there are exceptions in each project and these are clearly communicated during the balloting process).

Read about the experiences of older Nightingale community members in our interviews with Teresa, Val, and Hilary and Jeph.

Yes, you can have pets living with you in your Nightingale home.

Yes, there are many parents and caregivers living with children in Nightingale homes, from babies to little kids to teenagers.