We bought the house!! :)

Rolleigh

 

I've gotta say, I've never actually seen Pretty in Pink... maybe sometime....
BTTF was mentioned up thread, and it's a classic.

 

Older neighbour "Joyce" who is around 80 was doing some cleaning up at her place across the street and found an old photo album at her home that dates back to 1967! (Yes... 50 years ago!)
It has some photos of our house from that time, so cool!
Various photos show the front was enclosed, (apparently the owner at that time had 4 kids and needed the extra bedrooms, the back extention only came into life in 1986), the house next door was not there (it was an empty grassy lot), the back balcony wasn't there, only a small verandah maybe 1.2m wide. The people who owned our house had a lot of land previously, even to the side and behind our house and later they subdivided.

She also said that people never cared for trees and they were mostly cut down, now people aren't allowed to do this without council approval. She said she could see right over to Dence Park, people used to be amazed by the view... but now the trees are all in the way.

Anyway, so interesting!
We took photos of the photos.
She knew the previous owners going back quite a while and has pics of the kids who used to live here who now would be around 60

 

Ok, I have a broad tailed Gecko. He's so cute!!!

Broad-tailed gecko - Wikipedia
According to Wikipedia:
Habitat:
"Rocky areas, particularly in the sandstone outcrops near Sydney. However, it has adapted well to human settlement, finding shelter between bricks, in sheds, woodpiles and garages."

 

One year anniversary since settlement was yesterday!
And here's a tawny frogmouth that was spotted in a tree in our yard today. Extremely content.

 

Did you bake the house a cake? Then again, theres always a reason to have cake

 

Long time no posting on this thread! House is going amazing

Just had a look in the 128 page Heritage review "Epping Town Centre (East)" from June 2017. Our house has a photo in there and is described as "Victorian stone cottage, the oldest dwelling in the East Epping HCA"

"HCA" = Heritage Conservation Area

Very cool.

 

When did we buy the house? Right in that dip at the end of 2015 when clearance rates in Sydney fell to about 50%. Market has been strong in this area since, a house 400m away (comparable sized land, same distance to station) sold 3 weeks ago for $3mill.
Bwahahaha

 

@Gockie
Met a couple from Epping yesterday they told me this market is on fire. How much more has your property gone up from purchase??

 

One house behind is tagged to go to auction and the price guide is 3mill. I reckon ours is probably a house on par with it, though their house is different. Those owners bought for 1.1mill in July 2012...

Anyway, if they get that money, it will be good for them and for us, but I have no plans to sell.
Ps. North Epping is also really strong. A number of sales in the 2's are coming through. Crazy stuff.

 

Very nice, making money while you sleep

 

Hey @Gockie some nice CG since you bought for sure The $3m+ price bracket in your area usually means either a newer build or renovated sizeable home on some flat land and preferably with other highly desirables eg: spacious internals, north to rear, good feng-shui aspects, preferred school catchments etc. How popular Epping continues to be, but not surprising given it's location really. Hence all the new building going on Certainly changed quite a bit since I went to OLMC in Oxford St many many years ago

One of these days I'm going to run into you during my walks in the area- would love to see inside your gorgeous house!

 

Yes - please drop by @Jacque!
The trains (for convenience) and schools are huge drivers. Add in lovely homes, very green area.... i'm very happy here. My office will be moving from Parramatta to the city and while that move isn't a problem for me (i'd catch a train rather than bus), it's not as good for many other staff members.

Something I've noticed, my street gets used by learner drivers on the weekend. They do laps....

 

My area (Epping/Cheltenham/Beecroft) in the olden days....

 

Not only is there a mulberry bush (and Yay, Mulberry season!!!) & Scrub turkeys, I've just discovered a local echidna at the path to my bus stop. Just love this

 

The house looks amazing! Congratulations

 

Hello! Well, it's now 2 years since we exchanged contracts.

It's a really great spot.
I've been unicycling around the block (really quiet and ideal streets for this sort of activity - also been seeing this man ride around on an electric skateboard in front of my place a few times yesterday). Kids ride their bikes around too, which is lovely to see. It's also a location that I can walk, or ride a pushbike or even unicycle to the station. The local streets aren't busy.

Neighbours - they are a mixed bag, some keep to themselves while others are friendly and good to talk with. One family (a family with 3 kids) come say merry christmas and make home made festive chocolate snacks gifts.
Most people round here buy here and don't leave till death (there was a deceased estate sale maybe a year ago... huge land holding). Lady across the road has been here 60 odd years. She's 90 years old but still active.

I had a look around on google maps and saw there's 3 privately owned tennis courts in the backyards of the street I'm at the corner of - I knew of 1 of the courts, didn't know of the other 2

Wildlife - there is wildlife. In the area that I saw the echindna in, the neighbour across the road said he saw a snake there.

Anyway, was using RP data and found some graphs. Note: we owned in the other part of this postcode since 2008. Which was a good time to buy.

Also note: I really like the East side of Epping. But apparently this last section of Epping Road is being widened to have 3 westbound lanes, but there are no plans to widen the 4 lane (2 each way) bridge over the train line though! That's really going to be the bottleneck.

But with traffic changes, (apparently with the traffic reconfiguration, they won't let cars go west from Langston Place, which is terrible because all this traffic will be forced to go another way), and i'm sure it will be bottleneck city. Could be a nightmare for all people from North Epping and my part of Epping. With our jobs, we personally rarely have the need to drive peak hour, however it is always a good thing if the option is there. It's a let's see what happens moment, not something we have much control on unfortunately.

 

RP Data! It was very easy to generate these graphs (I only just learnt that)
Look at that boom.... we bought in the small dip end of 2015 but sold the previous PPOR (that was bought at a good time - mid 2008) a few months later in a very solid market

 

Just opened an email from Realestate.com stating what they reckon our house is worth. The prediction? Around a million more than we paid.... (which was just 2 and a half years ago and it was with high confidence...)

Of course, we have no plans to sell right now...

 

Just another note on my neighbours. The neighbours with the 3 kids were going for a push bike ride in the Lane Cove
National Park around North Epping. So I joined them. I see they are competent riders (dad and the son can do wheelies) so I gave them a unicycle. The boy (about 11 years old) learnt to ride it within about 10 days.... just gobsmacked.

Anyway, gorgeous family, left me these cards in my mailbox...

I met another local lady, she'd be ~65ish, plays flute (if I recall correctly) in an orchestra, and she is also a unicyclist!!! Omg!!

Also I've been helping with set building at the local theatre on Saturday mornings, it's just up my street. Got my name in the last program, I'll get it in this current production's program too. And one of the helpers there, he also can ride a unicycle.... omg.....