Rudy

Hi all,


Knowing what you do now, where would you settle in the Brisbane / Sunshine Coast area?

For things like best public schools, nice area and environment, people, convenience etc.

I know its a tall order, but there seems to be so many people on the forum looking at this region, I think your honest comments will be most helpful. Just visiting an area never gives you the true perspective on what its really like to live there!

Rudy

Just wanted to bring this back to the top, hope you "Ozzies" are awake now!

Kiwipaul

Hi Rudy

Well if I had no concerens about anything but position I'd chooses Mooloolaba on the SC, but to be realistic I need a big city for my work and so I'm living in Brisbane. SC is really too far to comute eaisily to Brisbane it's 100kms at the closest (Caloundra). Also the SC is virtually totally tourism orientated and the supporting infrastructure.

The same applies to the GC but GC is within commuting distance of Brisbane (about 1 hour) it's bigger than SC and so their is more industry down their besides the tourism side of thing.

Their are so many good suburbs in all 3 locations your best bet is to rent somewhere central for 6 months and then look around properly before decideing where to buy.

I cannot advise you where to live as I don't know your preferences, likes and dislikes and only you can decide when you get here and you've had a look around.

welshgirl

Hi Rudy
We arrived in Brisbane about a month ago and drove all the way up to Cairns looking for places to settle. We arrived back on the Sunshine coast last week as this was the nicest place we saw on our travels, and have spent all week in Caloundra which is basically the start of the SC. We are off to Perth next week to see what all the fuss is about down there, but have decided that if Perth isn't for us we will come here to live. Caloundra leads to Mooloolaba and has a few suburbs in between linking it all together. We have seen 2 possible sites where we might like to build a house, and have spent all day today looking at show homes. It is near the coast, only 1 hour from Brisbane and is quite touristy - which works well as regards employment for my boyfriend who is a chef. I would say come here and talk to people about the area and go to every real estate agent (and believe me there are loads) to see what they all have to say about certain areas. We even picked the brains of the Home Loans lady in the bank. Keep an eye out for the huge billboards on the side of the road directing you to new builds too, as you get loads of info from these people in the land sales offices about how the place is being expanded. Hope this helps you.

Ken

Hello Welshgirl,

I will be interested in hearing your views of Brisbane vs Perth once you have seen what the fuss is about!

Rudy

Thanks for the replies, we are looking at areas both North and South of Brisbane. We will definitely rent for 6 months to a year before we make a firm decision on area, but my main concern is finding a nice area that has good schools. We have a son of 14 and a daughter of 12. We would ideally like to find a school that will suit them and hopefully get that right first time, so that we don't have to uproot them again. It will also obviously depend on where we can find employment, but we don't mind commuting a fair distance.

Looking at areas on the net is very deceiving. There are so many places that look really nice, but we don't have the local knowledge about the area, and that can make all the difference.

I know we will have different needs to others, and ultimately we will make our choices on where to settle, but I value the views of those of you who are already there. We will talk to a lot of estate agents etc, but I don't think you can always believe everything they tell you - no offence, but they have houses to sell in specific areas, so their loyalties are a little biased.

Thanks

Hazel.

DagBoy

Hi,

It is a very difficult question that you ask - it is so hard to guess what other people might like, but.....I will try and at least tell you something.
If you want to see where the suburbs I mention are, go to whereis and do a search. This is also really useful for those realestate web sites that provide addresses.
As a general rule, there are very few suburbs that are awful, though there are plenty where I would not like to live. When I first came over here we lived in my wife's house in Loganlea. Not a very inspiring suburb (and actually outside Brisbane City Council - under Logan City). There are a few suburbs near there that are pretty dire, though there are also some nicer areas down there and houses/land can be cheaper. On the plus side, it was close to the SE freeway and only took me about an hour to communte into town and was also handy for trips down to the Gold Coast. On the negative side - too many to list, so unless cost is your main factor I would avoid that.
For convenience conside the public transport options into town. The rail links are very good and there is a dedicated busway that runs alongside the SE freeway from Mt Gravatt in. Look on a map for the main rail links and then look on Qld Rail's website for the timetable - you can then work out which suburbs are within 30 mins of town by train.
If you are after a "nice" suburb you will generally have to pay more, particularly for the ones with "cafe" society. Do a realestate search on any of these (Bulimba, Hawthorne, Ascot, Clayfield, Wooloowin, Toowoong, Spring Hill, St Lucia, Inala) and you will see that they are desirable and hence expensive (Oh by the way, I lied about Inala). If you find a nice traditional 3 bed Queenslander on 32 perches (809m2) in any of those suburbs, compare it to one in the slightly less desirable (but still nice) suburbs - such as Graceville, Sherwood, Coorparoo, Taragindi, Salisbury) and see the difference. You get more house for your money but you get less snob value.
If you want something with a decent sized yard (40+ perches, or quarter acre is 1000 m2) you will have to look further afield.
When we were looking to buy (basically for the last 2 years on and off) we pretty well did all the suburbs within 15k radius, so if you have specific questions please ask. For your info, we bought in Wakerley (out towards the bay at Wynnum/Manly) and went for acreage (just under 3) - mainly so as to have space for the boys.

Hope this helps some,
Cheers

Rudy

Thanks for that, I will search the realestate sites etc for the areas that you mentioned later tonight. Do you know if there are good schools in the areas you mentioned, by that I mean schools that have a "good" name and achieve good academic results? Or would you say most schools are much the same?

We have been looking at houses with land over 1000m2 in areas including Pine Rivers shire, Calamvale, Cashmere, Parkinson, Eatons Hill, Albany Creek, Morayfield and many more.

The interesting thing was we thought that Forest Lake looked really nice on the net, and then we met someone from Brisbane and he said steer clear of the area.

We were hoping to arrange a rental property before we arrive, but I'm starting to think it would be better to wait until we've had a look around at areas!

Exciting stuff this isn't it !?!

Kiwipaul

Strongly recommend you don't rent sight unseen, plus if it's unfurnished you generally have to sign up for min 6 months.

Book a motel / hotel appartment for the first couple of days grab a car and a newspaper (pref Saturadays as their are 100 of rental properties listed) and drive round looking at them. Or pick a suburb and vist the estate agents as they handle loads of rentals, and you'll have no trouble finding one for immediate occupancy (but it wiil be unfurnished).

Most will try and tie you into 12 month rental but insist on only 6 month with rolling option.