Jacqui

[QUOTE=Would this be the Dalyellup beach estate?
We live on Dalyellup and we can hear the waves crashing, if you have the money, $400k plus just for a 550 sqm plot no house $850k up for a house as well, then you can live overlooking the beach.[/QUOTE]

Sorry Kevin, when we drove around Dalyellup I could have sworn it was further inland! But that was over 5 years ago, and my sister drove us around so many places that day, my memory is clearly fuzzy!

Jacqui

[QUOTE=looking at the land sizes, we are sitting in a 300m2 at the moment here in the UK and to be honest if we could purchase something with 500m2 at a decent price then we would be delighted. we deffinately feel that we dont need that big a home, just a litle more space for the pool in the back garden[/QUOTE]

Don't forget to allow for possibly building only a one-storey house, like most people do here, and you will be required to set the house back x number of metres, so there will be a lawn area out the front too. A single-storey on 500m2 will not get you a big backyard (fine if you don't like gardening) and a pool could eat into what yard you do have. It's hard to compare lot size with what you have in the UK, the houses are laid out differently. It's not uncommon for people to be waiting 2 years for a new build, make sure you have enough rental to allow for delays.

Sunny_Glesga

We have allowed for a possibility of building a one-storey house as most are built this way as far as we can see. I personally would like to have a 2-storey which would obviously allow us a bigger back garden and for us to look at smaller plots.


I know that it could take up to maybe 2 years to have a house built with a building company but the OH isn't planning on using a company to do the build, He is planning on project Managing the build completely by himself and will be doing 75% of the work involved in the build,the rest of the work that we Can`t touch, i.e electrical,Gas,Plumbing will be done by bringing in the tradies.this is where we may have issues, we know that we have to make applications to do this but as we have found it aint that much different from the UK. As i mentioned in my previous posting the OH basically build the house from scratch.

Although the OH is a Plasterer and has been for 20yrs now he has been blessed with being able to put his hand to almost anything which he had a chance to prove when his Brother asked him to manage the complete build of his home which photo is in the last posting. he has always wanted to do this here in the UK but i was never that confident but now that he has taken the opportunity to use someone else`s money (sad) i am now very confident in his ability.

It did take a while for me to come round on doing it this way as i know we will have enough on our plate with the other things to stress about like, schools for the kids,finding somewhere to rent along with our dog, But, i`m sure we will get there.

thanks Jacqui for making all the points you have mentioned, it does make me think a bit, and believe it or not, it really helps as i do then wonder if we have thought everything through, and have we considered everything.

I know that some who may take the time to read this post will think, ( how the hell is he going to build a house by himself ? have they got a few screws loose? BUT. I`m certain that there are ppl out there who have done this themselves before.

kevinl

No worries Jacqui, I know how confusing it can get putting names to places.

Rereading my post it sounds like we have one of those by the beach, we don't unfortunately but it is only about a 15min walk.

Google Earth can be a few years behind, my house in England has a car I sold 2.5 years ago on the drive.
The pictures of Dalyellup must be a bit more recent as our house here is only just over a year old and is on Google earth, though the shed isn't and that was put in about 8 months ago.

Some friends of ours have just started a kit home self build, he is a chippie and doing all but the licenced bits himself.
You do need to be in the right place to get planning permission for a self build, Dalyellup and other new estates tend to have lots of restrictive covenants.

Let me know if you need any more info but I wouldn't make any definite plans until you get here, you may find things are quite different to how they looked from the UK.

Kevin

kevinl

Just had a look on the realestate site and I think prices are stabilising/dropping.
We bought in May and ours was the only house under $400k and that was because they had run out of money to finish it, so we are finishing it still, now, there are a good half dozen houses under $400k and I would bet you could push them quite a bit more.
It wouldn't bother me if they did drop, the real estate agent tried very hard to make us strech ourselves to buy as big as we could on the theory that the more we spent then the more we would make as a percentage of any rise.
10% rise on a $400k house would be $40k, 10% rise on a $600k would be $60k, so her theory was you made an extra $20k, my worry was a 10% drop would offer the exact reverse and be money we couldn't afford.
Off subject I know but I'm sure of interest to the OP.

Kevin