neil32

Hi,

Looking for the names of some nice family friendly Melbourne suburbs also with good nursery's and schools.

Looking at about 25-30km out of the city, 3 bedroom house at about $400 per week

Suburbs I've looked at so far some in my price range some over are

Point Cook
Yarraville
Mordialloc

Buzzy--Bee

Hi Neil, I've lived in Mordialloc for 6 years. It is a very nice family friendly area with great kinders and schools. If you can get a 3 bed house for $400 per week it will probably be a bit of a wreck. To get anywhere half decent you'll need an extra $100 per week. Bear in mind that as a tenant you don't have to pay rates (Council Tax) so that may help the budget.

Yarraville is a trendy, edgy, almost inner city suburb. I think I could happily live there if I wanted a couples lifestyle and not a family lifestyle.

Point Cook is a massive new housing estate. A lot of people love it. I've only been there twice so hopefully someone will be along soon who knows it better. Personally, I'm not attracted to the new estates as although the houses are large and modern the areas often don't feel as nice as the established areas where there's well-rooted communities.

Hope that helps - if you want to know any more about Mordialloc please ask.

BB

Pomster

If you like a big house, spend lots of time at home and never commute in rush hour. Point Cook is fine. Otherwise it is a nightmare. Poor choice of secondary schools, a recently opened railway which is still a couple of kms drive from point Cook itself...and driving home in rush hour is stop/start. (Can you tell I live very close by?).

Yarraville is nice- has a villagey feel, good transport links, plenty of green spaces.
#
Out of these two I would chose Yarraville in a heartbeat over PC.

Kiwikaye

I can recommend around where we are in Mount Waverley. You can get a slightly older (50's or 60's) property for around $400 per week. We are around 20ks from the city, with a 30-45 minute commute time by train to the city. Excellent schools and private daycare, although the council kinders can be tight to get into if you try to get in during the year, rather than starting at the beginning. We've been here for just over a year now and its a nice area with lots of families - the school is very sought after and you have to be in the area to get in (which is the case with most schools in Melbourne).

Our place is 3 bedrooms, 2/3 living areas and a big garden for the kids for $400 per week. If you want a newer property, you may need to look at Point Cook or similar. A fairly new place around here will be around $600-700 per week and likely to be a townhouse with limited garden space.

Feel free to ask if you want any more info.

neil32

Hi,

Thanks for the information...

I've had a look at rentals again on domain.com.au

Eltham $550+ a week maybe get something for $500 if lucky
Mount Waverley older styles for my price range as Kiwikaye said
Yarraville $550+ a week
Mordialloc expensive for my price range
Point cook loads in my range

I am looking for something fairly more modern (I know my budget is not a great amount), family area and good schools... Is point cook really that bad?

Both of us or at least one would be working in city


Can anyone recommend any other areas?

Jilliebee

Eltham is a lovely area. We live nearby in Yallambie and love it here. Hubby commutes to city. Goes in on train and cycles home x

Kiwikaye

If you're looking at newer areas you could also look around Taylors Lakes/Sydenham. We used to live in that area and you would definitely get something newer in your price range. Parkwood Green is a fairly good primary school and there's heaps of childcare centres around there, so not as difficult to get into as some of the closer-in suburbs. Its around 25k from the city and IMHO has better transport and commuting links that Point Cook.

GarryP

It's not bad at all, IMHO. Just some aspects should be better.

The journey into the CBD in rush hour isn't fun, but then again that's true of the eastern suburbs too. There are two avenues for commuting to jobs in the CBD; the road/bridge, and the metro.

The road gets stop/start during the morning/evening journeys - adding significantly to the journey times (think motorway into London during rush hour) since they haven't expanded the road network with the new housing. If you want to get a feel for the relative congestion west vs east can I suggest picking a time during the morning rush (say 10pm UK time) and checking google maps with the traffic layer turned on. IIRC you can also try out various journeys via "get directions" and it will tell you the journey times 'in current traffic' - that should give you a flavour. Remember, there are toll roads in the east - so any quicker times using those should be weighed against the cost incurred.

The alternative is the metro. From Point Cook there are effectively three stations you can use. Laverton is on the zone1/2 boundary, so lots of people go there to get the costs down. The parking maybe free, but gets totally chocka from about 7:30-8:00 am - the journey into town is ~30 mins in rush hour, and anything from 20-40mins outside. Of the other two stops, the new one is 'Williams Landing', which they have hooked into a revised local bus network (that being the planners idea of a solution to the transport). In theory, if you are near a bus route, then that's a possible commuting option (although at higher cost, and it's not really a solution as such). Obviously there is also the option of cycling to the station (Laverton has locked cycle storage).

Overall, infrastructure has not kept pace with the building and they need to do something serious, soon. However the local politicians are even less use than the usual local politicians in the UK...

Generally Point Cook is laid out as 'estates' where the developer flogs off blocks of land and usually provides some park space / amenities for the residents (health club, pool, resturant, etc.). That means there are lots of new houses coming onto the market, and a fair few being bought as investment properties (eg rented out) - so a good turnover. I personally would say that the Sanctuary Lakes element is quite different to the bulk Point Cook estates, what with the golf course, lake, onsite security and gated communities - consider it separately.

I can't give you any pointers as to the quality of the schools, but they seem OK to an outsider.

$400 for a 3/4 bed with double garage is quite achievable, quantity of garden is variable (aussies don't seem to go in for gardens, they die in the summer). One thing I would say is that 4 bed are usually not massively more expensive than 3 bed, but can have more space than just the extra bedroom.

Also bear in mind ADSL access (much better now, but check), walkability to where you need to go, the fact that 2 storey houses get hot upstairs in summer (need aircon) and what 'outdoor' lifestyle you want.

ozzieeagle

Diggers Rest

The difference with this place compared to the other "Estate" Locations is 3 or 4 different routes to work if one gets blocked. A fair few airport employees out that way, so I'm guessing the schools are Ok.

Buzzy--Bee

Much of the East would not use the Monash or the Eastlink to commute though, I can't imagine anyone living bayside for instance would use either.

BB

GarryP

Some points wouldn't, but quite a lot would. That's kind of why there are toll roads there at all - they wouldn't build them if you could travel as fast on non-toll roads - particularly during rush hour.

We kind of need an up to date commute times map for Melbourne, probably cross correlated with how much it costs for decent 3 bed in each location.

Buzzy--Bee

I think you just stuck your hand up to produce that one. Needs a Z-axis too, of availability of good curries/fish and chips/sausages/pubs showing premier league in the local area.

BB

RedDragon2008

new houses doesn't necessarily mean better insulated homes so maybe a bummer to heat and cool in the hotter Summer days. also newer estates have less established schools or maybe enough schools for the children living around, plus it's been shown that public transport maybe sparce

GarryP

Don't exactly have enough time to do it properly, but I might see if I can capture a few examples tomorrow, if I get up early enough

New Homes after 2005 have had to hit 5-star energy ratings.
New Homes after 1 May 2011 have to hit 6-Star energy ratings.

Most old houses would be about the 2 star level.

So although those standards aren't great in comparison to something like passivhaus (which would be about 9.5 star), new houses should indeed be better on average. The big hole is air tightness - the Australian standards don't pay enough attention.

Buzzy--Bee

The big hole is the Australian standards - not insisting on airtightness doesn't help, nor does the fact that they focus so much on which way the windows are facing that they forget completely about thermal mass - which is the reason why UK houses retain heat so much better - the brick internal walls retain daytime heat and release it at night. In Australia the internal walls are largely made of reconstituted skimmed up pallets, silicon and fresh air. There's not even any insistence on internal insulation which means houses internally are one great big enormous space which is very hard to heat and cool efficiently.

BB