Mandy Bale

Hi Herman, (I'm a bit nervous replying here as I'm bound to get slagged off but here goes!)

We are living in Cherrybrook/Castle Hill area which is about 50 mins on the bus to Sydney CBD (Hubby works there and takes the bus every day, bus stop is just down the end of our road). We are renting at the mo as we have only been here for 8 months and it is cheaper at the moment to rent than it is to buy (the rent we pay actually amounts to being cheaper than paying off the interest on a $450k mortgage!). Yes there are properties around here that are in the 1 million mark but they are mostly large houses and a bit extravagent. for the ordinary family like us we have been looking at 4 bed houses in this very nice area for around $550 - $600, now a couple of months ago there weren't that many around for that price there were more for $650 -$700 but just recently there has been an increasing amount in our price range. I pick up all the 'homes pictorial' magazines every week and scour the pages and there are some lovely houses in this weeks within our price range (yes I have looked at them and they are lovely). If you aren't worried about having a detatched house then the duplexes and semi detatched around here are going for around $450 - $500k and they are very nice for that money. The land around here is very expensive, some just went around the corner for us for $410k for 700m2 which by the time you get a house built on it is a lot of money! The area we are in is hardley dull, but then we have a family and we think it is a great place to bring up a family, lots of sports going on and only a 5 minutes drive to the rural areas and the school we have our kids in is superb. There are some excellent shopping centres around here too. People always talk about north rocks and ryde or epping being good 'active' places but these places are literally a 10 minute drive away from us, so we aren't that far from it all!

anyway thats my view on our area, I'm sure someone will tell you different but then everyone has different views of areas just depends on what you like! we certainly love it here even if we have to rent for a few years

pommie bastard

I am sure the area you in is great even though its so far out ,but why rent and in the few years that you do house prices will climb and to get a foot on the housing ladder becomes even harder .
So it must be the case that you can not afford to buy? is your employment worth while most on this forum seem very quiet about their wages and jobs in Australia.

Mandy Bale

Hubby earns $65 per hour doing IT job in CBD, we just aren't ready to buy yet. After speaking to several independant advisors we have been advised to wait and see what the market is going to do as they are under the impression that it will stabalise and slow soon, maybe even fall, we hope. We got bitten in the UK in '89 we are not about to buy property at the top end of the market if there is a wiff of a fall! We also like having money in the bank for a change rather than struggling with dept!

Just imagine buying a house then being out of work and the housing market deflating, as apposed to renting with money in the bank and being able to downgrade the house if we needed to. At the moment we don't want to be exposed to the volatile housing market. It might pay off, who knows, but time will tell! We feel we are doing the right thing for us and we are living in a nice big house now.

What do you think?

pommie bastard

Well impressed with your husbands wages then again its Sydney which has higher living costs,and the way IT is right now jobs are going fast.
Can anyone where ever in the world save enough to keep up with house prices thats beyond what I know, but a home is asset worth investing in I would have thought.
There is a train of thought in Australia that renters pay some one elses mortgage , if this is so invest in a home to rent maybe let some one pay yours while you rent there are tax benifits , which you could offset against your husbands top rate of tax.

Mandy Bale

Yes we have thought of investing in a smaller property but if there is a fall in the market the smaller properties would be hit the hardest, but at the end of the day we have only been here for 8 months and are just finding our feet and we don't want to rush into anything, we are happy as we are and enjoying life for a change and are happy to be as we are for a couple of years while the kids are young. a couple of years of our life renting isn't a big deal in the big picture of things. You never know we may change our minds and go and live in another state in a couple of years, with renting we have that option without too much hassle. At the moment the kids are in a good school and settled and we would like to keep it that way for a couple of years. We may have different views in a few years, who knows. But cheers for your input.

dpr21

Yeah, tough one that.

We were faced with the same dilemma in Perth. However median price increases seem to have been more gradual and sustained and did not reach almost 'exponential like' rises like some of them seemed to do on the East Coast. In the end we figured if there is a slowing down or even bubble burst it will affect us to a lesser degree in WA (here's hoping). So we bought. Also the absolute prices are lower so although we won't get the massive gearing you guys might have previously seen in the East our risk is lower - good we think in the current climate. Roll on world economic recovery

DPR

dpr21

OK PB put your money where your mouth is - what do you do and what do you earn? Try being specific i.e. if you are a toolmaker say so and don't hide behind behind some generic term like 'engineer'.

For the benefit of all, I am an outpatient/sport injuries physiotherapist (>10 years in same clinical area) and my pay varies between $27-35 per hour (no other benefits - I am not in a permanent position as I will be doing further tertiary study next year). I can earn more (apparently $35-$40 per hour) for short locums in the middle of nowhere.

For the benefit of those few physios who may be coming from the UK, clinical autonomy tends to be higher in Oz as is the percentage of private vs public sector work available. Unlike the UK, however, agency work is a small fraction of the total work available thus it is harder to find good work until you actually get here. Like the UK, and elsewhere in the world, there are some fantastic people here as well as the usual snake-oil salesmen

DPR

scrawni

I watched place in the sun as well, I think the house prices are great even though they are going up, it just seems like investment city to me especialy since i hope to buy a property outright with no mortgage( fingers crossed, if all stays the same with the housing market at home I should be fine.) I have a while to wait yet as I am only just about to apply for a visa but I keep looking and keep dreaming.

Blokey

Er, Zilpah's not from Yorkshire, she's from Lancashire. She's a friend of mine. And she's gorgeous

tinaj

Anyone know when the new series is starting?

Blokey

Started on Monday. Zilpah is on again on Thursday and Friday this week. The other presenter is called Bella Crane.