Steve99

Hasnt been better for a long time. Unfortunately we had to send all our money back to UK in Feb. Who knows what will happen $£ now things are beyond prediction.

Most western suburbs have a doggy element, a bit of violence, drugs and rough appearance. Footscray is now expensive but rough, like some of the East-end and South London suburbs, however it has lots of eateries etc and close to the city. With these suburbs you need to check it out street by street and how close it is to potential trouble and how far from the station etc on a dark night. I could just about live there if I was younger and single maybe, my wife could not. It would be easier to live in Bachus Marsh then go into the city when you wanted and of course much cheaper however a bit drab and soulless though.

For commuting you need a train line. The tram lines will not get you far out in 40mins as they are very slow. There is only one rapid bus line from Doncaster to the east of Melbourne and if you move there you had better speak Chinese. If you want established, civilised and a somewhat desirable suburb to live in you need to go to the South East or perhaps East of the city, West and North tend to be somewhat rougher by nature, including many of the inhabitants. Much depends on your budget. In the higher priced rental bracket there is less competition than in the lower priced where scores of people per available house/flat are competing to keep a roof over their heads. Newer rentals are nearly always in better condition than old as most landlords have a 'do nothing' approach to tenants. Modern double story town houses can be nice to live in. Blocks of flat can have noisy tenants and older houses can be very run down as a rule. As for cost of utilities, about 30-50% more than the best deals in the UK, we know as we just moved back to the UK, dito mobile phones and cable TV etc (which on the whole is dire).On the whole there are no bargains and at the bottom of the market you dont get what you pay for so best avoided. Good luck

Hi, you should be alright for the short time there and Long-island is nice in the summer-early autumn months.. Check out the suburbs along the Frankston line between Carrum and Mentone (probably the nicest along that line with the best balance of what you need/want and full of private and nice enough state schools and close to shopping etc). These are mostly quite nice, near the beach, a bit closer to the city 40- 50 mins, somewhat more up market than Frankston and state schools, certainly at primary level seem pretty nice. The good thing about these suburbs is that you will not be completely car-bound.

Beware of Frankston, much of it is somewhat unsavoury with a huge amount of anti social behaviour, drugs are also rife. South Frankston is a nice residential suburb and quite different. We are currently at a caravan park on the edge of Frankston visiting family. Every night the main road outside (Mooraduc Highway) is a drag strip for a handful of psychopath drivers and in the morning when we drive out we find the road criss crossed with tyre marks. When we did live nearby before returning to the UK last year we found it was impossible to park at the station if you went after about 7.15 and you will probably have to drive to a station as not much residential (that you would care to live in) is walking distance. Trains mostly reliable during the week but many weekends there are closures for line upgrades and repairs. 3 times on this visit we have been tossed off the trains to continue for a few stations on the bus.

0.5 for Affordable can make it a serious deal breaker. Think the weighting on some of these things needs to be considered on an individuals means and needs. Economically I guess it will come down a lot in the next few years.

You mean like real people? teachers? bus drivers? nurses? shop workers? is this the hoi polloi that you dont need near your home and workplace? These hoi polloi and many more cannot afford to : a) live anywhere near where they work if it is in one of Oz's so called capital cities (we only have one real capital city) ie they become the fringe dwellers (still stuck with mega mortgages and rents) and: b) afford to live an independent life re proper housing etc without recourse to family money or other handouts This is why my wife and I moved back to the UK. We have a much higher quality of life there than we could possibly imagine here, purely due to housing costs.. ps. This survey is assuming the costs in US $ from the viewpoint of being someone from NewYork and as the Oz$ is down against that the last few years makes us look less expensive however do the sums in Aus$ and wages and you get a completely different result.

''Although saying that I have been to Melbourne, and it is also awesome.'' It is, so long as you can afford to live in a few choice suburbs and not be relegated to a $500k shack in the far flung (60km) public transport-less outburbs. Which is why we have more or less moved back to the UK, bought a proper house, dont really need too much work between now and pension (unemployable in Melbourne due to being circa 60yo but would have had to have gone on the dole given another year or two of unemployment) have easy transport links to small cities, Stansted airport direct and London in just over an hour, however still have to spend far too much time here for sick family reasons. Did 2 years in Perth back in the 70's, was tumbleweed city then and suspect that if all the benefit of the mining construction boom wears off it will be again sometime in the future.

We can see how it has progressed in Sydney/Melb/Australia however many people including Steve Keen did not know how far our highly esteemed politicians would go to prop the market up. Lets look at some of these props: Negative gearing, which is a hand out to the already well housed who are into property speculating and works against first home buyers for eg when they are competing with Speculators. For non Aus people reading this, say you buy a BTL flat, take out a massive loan and the costs over a year are more than the flat makes in returns (This is done on purpose in most cases) Then whatever loss can be put against your main work or business income and thus push you down to maybe a lower tax bracket (they have several schemes for well off people to do this and not just with speculative housing) Capital gains tax reduction 50% on speculative property held then sold after 12months Massive immigration scheme which is playing havoc on infrastructure and housing just like in the UK. Open market which is encouraged for foreign buyers (particularly China) to come in keep their money safe from their own government etc, also a speculative punt. This accounts for many 1000's per year Very lax lending standards in which Australian banks now have the highest proportion in the world of their loans going to Mortgage debt! They too are more interested in the speculators than in housing for real people. Low interest rates. State governments are in charge residential land releases via some crony development companies and just like the UK, land banking with drip feed land release keeps prices very high. Like the UK the media has a very big say in house price mania as real estate businesses pay so much advertising to the news papers and other news outlets. The majority of the population are also roped into the mania and 'wealth' creation of real estate. First home buyer grants which have been introduced on and off for a couple of decades, each time causing a surge in prices. Big one on offer in Perth now that the Mining/building/employment boom is over. And so it goes, one thing after another.. Which one of these many props has to break to kill the market? How can some of these people still feel lucky? I say this is far worse than Ireland As for the quote: 'Why do we allow scaremongers and doomsayers with unfounded pessimism and unbridled negativity dictate our thinking and blunt consumer confidence?'' The same talk here of course when anyone speaks up. I say this is one massive bubble very much looking for a pin to pop it.

If you buy at a auction, the last two bidders are a)You and b) Dummy bidder who may be in the audience disguised as a buyer or on the phone pretending to be a out of town buyer.. Once it gets to the point that the reserve (always well above the estimated price, and they have reasons for under-quoting before the sale) is passed then they play it by ear as to how far you will take it.. The foreign Chinese that are buying big in Melbourne and Sydney will always bid more than a local. They will also buy houses that by law that they are not supposed to will very few/no repercussions. This is how the government likes it. Just like London, a massive money laundering city. They under-quote the potential price before an auction so that on Saturday (when most auctions occur) you will get a much bigger audience if people think this house to be auctioned is in their price range, also the agents want to lure potential buyers away from their REAgent competition doing the other auctions up the road. They dont mind playing mind-games with you or leaving you out of pocket with surveys etc.. If you think REAgents in the UK are bad, these parasites are on another planet, like the one Alien came from I think. :huh:

Strangely enough we have just been looking in a place where that is the norm.. Was up in the Noosa area just north of Brisbane where many of the flats/townhouses etc are used for this very purpose, often the site management discourage people from living in them full time (max 3 months per year all up) and rent them out for you the rest of the year. Seems the area to be is anywhere near the river in Noosaville or in Noosa heads itself. The renters on the whole seem to be a better quality than you might get in say the Gold coast. Also this part of the world is one of the few in Australia where tourist come just about all year, some places only do business during Christmas/Easter/school holidays. Don't know about value for money though, would have to do sums and check out what the occupancy levels are on average.

You can never bet on a crash but conversely what is holding prices up is the following Negative gearing which attracts speculators to the housing market. 1/2 price capital gains tax which attracts speculators also. Open door policy to foreign buyers for money laundering and hiding purposes and where there are rules they are not policed. Very low interest rates Restrictive land banking where land is held by government cronies and drip fed to the market. Very slack lending practices by the banks (regardless of what they and the press may say to the contrary) especially to speculators. Yes we have high immigration which puts pressure on prices somewhat. So all in all, a lot of government backed assistance to push up house prices for various vested interests and little or no concern for younger first time buyers or in fact those that want to save up and move up a bit, ie a very cruel and cynical part of Australian life and politics, in fact shows the same callousness as is applied to those in offshore detention centres with not a little amount of amusement thrown in for the entertainment factor amongst our erstwhile speculators and their morally corrupt politicians.. How many of these incentives aimed at the speculative side of price increases would in their absence precipitate a price crash? and for eg how much more money can real people throw at housing as a place to live? Jobs are not getting bigger and better and in fact on the whole are shrinking and becoming more unreliable (just look at Perth right now) And as pertaining to this forum, why would a pom sell a perfectly good house in the UK, give up their job to come over here in order to pay more for housing etc? especially as it is in an unreal price warp whereby it could easily collapse back to sane prices, even more than the UK could by rights. The dream of the old days is long gone, cheap housing, good wages, are no longer there and a few extremely hot days do not make up for it.

See the desperation in Perth where right on cue, they conjured up another $5000 FHBuyers grant.. some noise in the back ground about loosing 'investment' value cause that would cause prices to drop on current stock, especially on account that 1000's more houses are for sale than normal, ditto rentals. The pigs are starting to squeal and will get amusing when the banks stop lending into such a market. ps, its nice to know that in Australia we have a 'Treasurer for real estate prices' (I think that's his official title) in the shape of Scott Morrison who in fact used to work for the so called property council of Australia (a private lobby group), gives you a nice warm fuzzy feeling as the little rodent Howard used to say. 

A friend of mine, an older mechanical engineer who has been around the block a few times says he has never known it so bad.. This is in Victoria. Lots of various engineers coming back from Perth adding to the numbers of unemployed engineers also.. This seems to be at all levels.. He has a job and designs metal fabrication 'things' which is a big drop down from what he used to do, some sort of design engineering in heavy industry.. His wage is also much lower than it was in the year 2000 so if you are doing well in the UK you might be gambling to come over to Oz right now.

I suspect nothing much will be addressed as improving infrastructure is a cost whereas demand from immigration brings in immense profit for developers etc who are very big government lobbyists. ie, once you have bought your house and paid your mint to the land developer your job is complete.. In fact I know suburbs where 10 years after development they are still waiting for a bus service and cars queue up for 20mins to get out onto the main road. Cant wait till Melbourne is 8Million with the same infrastructure as today, cause that is what it will be more or less.