HomeMate.com.au

Financial pressure for first home buyers and renters in Australia is rising rapidly according to the AAH (Australians for Affordable Housing). The cost of housing has continued to rise despite no rise in the average income for most households. With rent or mortgage payments taking as much as 50% of the take home pay for [...]

Native gardens grow plants that naturally occur in the area. These take little more than a rainwater tank or natural rainfall to maintain because the plants have long since adapted to their environment. They need no fertilizer because their very shape and substance exists as a result of the particular mix of nutrients found in [...]

Joel Kotlin is an expert in city living and has studied trends of cities  and fertility rates around the World. But is he right about Sydney’s high density housing making you infertile ? I say no, and for several reasons. Firstly Australia’s fertility rate has been dropping since the pill was introduced. Secondly people are [...]

Is the housing shortage real, or just a trumped up story to give home buyers the hurry up. I have changed my mind over the past two years. After repeating the story for years on my blogs of a growing housing shortage in Australia believing it to be true, I now believe it might have [...]

Do Australians really want townhouses and apartments over a single house on a block? I doubt it, but that’s what a recent survey found. A recent article on Australians suggested that Australian home buyers were more interested in an apartment or a townhouse than in a quarter acre block. The great Australian dream of owning [...]

Central Coastal New South Wales Gosford City Council is moving to abolish the right of home owners & property investors to build dual occupancies and cluster housing in certain zoned areas, under a new local environment plan [LEP]. The LEP is awaiting NSW State Government approval. Planners and developers say this will severely restrict the [...]

As new home buyers sit on the side lines waiting to see what Federal and State Governments do next about housing affordability, home builders are feeling the pinch as the construction industry slump reaches it first birthday. I don’t buy that interest rates are too high. Interest rates are normal. The problem is that new [...]