Maddogsk

Me and my family (wife and three kids 10, 7 and 4) are looking to move to Brisbane.

Can anyone suggest some good suburbs for a family within 25 km of CBD and with $300,000 for a modern 4 bed house to spend?

As close to coast as possible with good state schools and train line to Brisbane.

Advice appreciated.

diddy

Hi,

Welcome to the forum.

This has come up alot so try a search on Brisbane Suburbs. Also give:

www.ourbrisbane.com ago and look at Living in Brisbane, Find a Suburb.

Paul.

mlbonner

(this is where everyone in Brisbane nominates their own suburb )

I live in Bracken Ridge, 20km out. Our 4 bed house, with pool is on the market at a little over your price, but you'd find a range of between $280-$420 for a standard 4 bed, with age/location/pool/aircon being the main variants.

www.realestate.com.au may help in the house hunting. The other link Paul has given you is good for a general suburb guide too.

Kiwipaul

You'll be struggleing to find a modern (I take it you mean brick) 4 bedroom house within 25kms of CBD unless maybe you go towards Ipswich. I seem to recall the meridian house price in Brisbane is now about $350,000 and that would be for a 3 bedroom.

You'd have a better choice if you could up your price to $400,000.

ABCDiamond

Tingalpa is only 14km from the CBD.

This one is listed at $284,500 on www.realestate.com.au
4 Bedroom, Airconditioned, 7 minutes to the sea - 20 minutes to the airport and Brisbane City Centre.

In my area you could get a 3 bed basic house at $300,000, But its a bit further out.

Maddogsk

Thanks guys.

I'd heard that Tingalpa wasn't too good an area. Is this not right.

What area do you live in ABCDiamond. Would $350,000 get me a good family home with what I am looking for where you are? Anything up to 25km out but with a train line to CBD is what I'm looking for?

ABCDiamond

I live 36km out, going East, and down a bit.

The property prices in an area can generally help in giving a guide to what an area is like. If it is a good area and cheap, then properties will become popular and then expensive

The Train line stops at Cleveland, 28kms out, on the route out my way. The cheapest shown in Cleveland is $337,000 here
4 bedrooms with ensuite and large covered outdoor entertaining area and above ground swimming pool.

I am biased towards the East, as I like this general area, and it's often cooler than in the West.

MrsDagboy

Tingalpa has a fair bit of industrial estate in the suburb which brings the prices down considerably. Depending on where you are in the suburb its also prone to some aircraft noise, may have large powerlines in the vicinity & can be prone to flooding.

Apart from that its not a bad area .

(Seriously, I could think of alot worse places to live in Brisbane! )

Brisbane bound

What do you think about Toowong? Do you think that it's a nice place to live? We are thinking of that area as it will be a walk or cycle away from where I will be working. We will be renting for 12 months. If my husband could get work locally, we could get away with having one car or no car at all. Then we would really feel as if we have escaped and started a new life!
Any thoughts?

Sophie Louise

I've never been there, but my boyfriend (who's from Brisbane) has an uncle living in Toowong, and feedback from boyfriend is that Toowong is great in terms of it's access to places, and how easy it is to get everywhere. The downside is that it tends to be full of smaller properties at higher prices, as it's a 'desirable' address, meaning people will pay over the odds for the status. Depends what your priorities are. He said it's the kind of place where 6 houses are all built on one acre, so not much land, but there is the advantage of it being near to everything - and land/ acreage might not be your priority anyway.

Not sure if that helps - just relaying the info!!

Sophie

Brisbane bound

Thanks for that, I think I get the picture, you've explained it well.

ABCDiamond

Here is an idea of Properties for sale in Toowong

It's very local to Brisbane City, 5 Km centre to centre.

MrsDagboy

Sophie has summed it up perfectly, probably the only thing I would add is that its also very close to Qld Uni (take that as a pro or a con depending on how you feel about student populations!) & that the suburb has very large percentage of unit blocks. If you buy or rent a house there the chances are high that it will be overlooked by a block of units.

(And actually I think Sophies b/fs uncle is being fairly generous - its more like 8+ houses per acre )

I dont know where your husband will be working & what your priorities are, but if it were me & I wanted to live close to the city, I would consider the Bulimba area.

jayr

Toowong would be a good place to rent at for 12 months. There is quite a lot of 'student' type life, mostly based around the RE (Royal Edward Hotel ,i.e. pub) and at the Regatta which is another 'pub' on the river. Being close to the city, it's a bit more urban than suburban and has its fair share of Chinese, Indian, Asian food outlets/restaurants and also a Coles, Woolies, David Jones etc. Cycle path from Toowong runs along the river all the way to the CBD, train station to go anywhere else. I stayed in Toowong for 6 weeks on arrival.