ken-6

Hi there
We are moving to the gold coast soon, my wife has a job at the new hospital. We would love any advice on family friendly suburbs to live. We have a 2 and a 5 yr old who is due to start prep in January so would like to be close to nice schools and ideally not too far from the beach. Our budget to buy isnt huge though - about $500 000. I know there have been other threads on this subject but we would love any advice, we change our minds daily from north gold coast like Arundel/Coomera to further south like Burleigh Heads. Thanks for your help. We live in Melbourne at the moment and are looking for a lifestyle change.

Simba

Pacific Pines is a good family friendly suburb and also an easy commute to the new hospital, there's a shopping center and schools within Pacific Pines and homes within your budget. It's also close to Helensvale for the train station and westfield shopping center.

Icecube

There has been a lot of coverage about Pacific Pines in this forum. All areas have positives and negatives but this particular area has had a lot more negatives of late eg shootings etc.

moneypenny20

Which new hospital? The new new one opening in 2013 at Parklands or the 'new' one at Robina (not new new but still new).

ken-6

The new one in Southport. We dont want to live in Pacific Pines - too many negative reactions to that one, stilll looking for any ideas

neil248

Wherever you buy on the Gold Coast check who your neighbours are. The nice 4/5 bed house next door could be a rental home to 7 students or motely crew complete with 7 sports exhausts and sub woofers.

The "family" house next door may never have seen a family.

We chose Bonogin which is lovely and without the above issues but no bus service means it is not that family friendly for older kids.

Patfink

Ashmore/Benowa areas are nice, about 5km from the new hospital.
we live in Ashmore which is an undulating leafy suburb very central to everything - Southport and Surfers within 10 minutes drive with good schools public and private nearby. Plenty of houses in your price range the only thing is most of them were built around 1980 and some are starting to look a bit dated. We have recently purchased here and are in the process of renovating but you will find houses here in your price range that have been modernised ie rendered exteriors new kitchen/bathroom.
We also have two kids - three and four years old and have similar aged neighbours with kids both sides of us and a nice park 100m down the road.