SYDNEY’S HOUSING GAME

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30666, 4 February 1965, Page 8

SYDNEY’S HOUSING GAME

fFrom

GRAEME JENKINS,

2V.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent]

SYDNEY, Feb. 3.

A harmless little game that can be played by any number of participants is sweeping Sydney. It is called “inspect the houses.** There are no specific rules to go by and no strict scoring system but it is generally agreed that top points at the end of each day’s play go to those who can produce the greatest number of business cards supplied by land agents.

The land agents themselves are not barred from entering so long as they do not try and pass off some of their own cards in the daily total.

There is no restriction as to the hours of play, but the most popular hours by far are those between 1 p.m. and

5 p.m. on Sundays. Extra points can be claimed by the players if they are able to show they have caused any dislocation to traffic while on their inspection visits. For the last several years there has been a steady rise in the number of own-your-own flats being built (actually they are caled ‘‘home units” in Sydney) with a fantastic mushrooming in such buiding in the last six months. Although many of the flats are bought before the actual building starts, land agents at present have almost more than they can handle hence their open invitations to “inspect now.” Loan Funds Buildings of “villages” is also popular with a builder developing a block of land into a semi-self-contained community even to the stage of providing ready-planted flower gardens. The “village” sales are generally in the outer suburbs where land values are still within reasonable

limits, while the “unit” building is generally done in the higher prices areas where the price of the land can be farmed out over a number of owners.

Costs generally seem alarmingly high, but with no apparent shortage of loan funds most of the flats are occupied very soon after the builders move out. Some of the closer-in north harbour and eastern harbour suburbs which until a few years ago were regarded as elite areas with houses occupying anything from a quarter-acre to a two-acre section, are now given almost entirely to home units of various styles, size and prices to suit. Even as far as 20 and 30 miles out from the city towering home units are shooting up. The greater distance to travel the less costly the price, but with the slowness and cost of public transport at the level it is, it is in the area within a seven or eight-mile radius of the

city centre that is most favoured. Late last week one agent announced proudly that his company had sold a penthouse flat in harbourside Point Piper for £36,750. The flat, which has a panoramic view of the harbour from the heads to the harbour bridge has four bedrooms, two bathrooms, lounge-dining room, ultra-modern kitchen and wide sun balcony. It was, said the agent, probably the most ever paid for a home unit in Sydney. Top Prices This claim faded somewhat two days later when another agent disclosed he had just sold another penthouse apartment of 3400 square feet in equally select Darling Point to a city businessman for £43,850 and furthermore had sold four others in the same building each for more than £40,000. The lowest-priced unit in the block was £14,550 with an average cost of £20,000. There are 60 units in the block.