There’s no doubt that living close to a capital city CBD has its advantages. There’s plenty of amenity in the way of shops, restaurants, cafés and, of course, public transport.
BY VANESSA DE GROOT
But I’m still quite, well, somewhat, baffled as to why people want to live so close to the city.
Really, what is it that most people need the city for? Unless you live right in the city and, rather than relying on a car, you merely step out of your apartment and use public transport and other services, then I would hazard a guess that most people rarely go into the city – they don’t need to, because everything they need is elsewhere.
If you work in the city, I can see that it’s convenient to live close by, so you can easily get transport in rather than having to pay exorbitant prices for parking, but what’s the difference between living five kilometres or 10 kilometres from the city? All it does really is add maybe another 10 minutes to your trip, which I don’t think is much at all.
A couple I know were recently looking for a house to buy, to live in. They were adamant they wanted to live in the inner city, the main reason being for convenience. They work in the city, so living close meant it was easy to get to and from work, which is understandable, but being a couple in their early 30s, they don’t really do anything else in the city.
Rarely do they dine at restaurants or have drinks in the CBD. In fact now most of the time they’re home because they can’t afford to do any of those things, because they bought a house where they wanted, close to the city.
If they were prepared to go just a little bit further out from the city they would have been able to buy a much bigger house and have a far less stressful mortgage – they’d have much more breathing space.
This got me thinking about why people really want to live close to the city. In many ways I think it’s a status thing. There’s some prestige to saying you live in a particular suburb, even if you’re eating baked beans to be able to afford it!
I had a conversation with someone recently who was telling me that their daughter was looking to buy a home, but could only afford to buy in the far outer suburbs of Melbourne and she didn’t like that – she wanted to buy something in an area closer to the city with a nice ring to it, one that comes with a nice little reputation. This confirmed for me that really, much of the desire to live in these inner-city suburbs is the status that comes with it.
Personally I’d rather live somewhere I can comfortably afford, with more space around me, and have the trip to work take that little bit longer.
And while inner city suburbs will no doubt see more growth in property prices, because this is clearly where people want to be, in some ways I think those suburbs just a little bit further out have better potential for property price growth. They’re the ones people will be looking to buy in because they can’t afford to buy closer in, hence prices will be driven up.
What do you think? Do you think that people buy in the inner city primarily for convenience or status, or both? And do you think it will be the inner city locations that see the most growth in property prices, or those a bit further out, that are yet to become the ‘in’ thing?
Vanessa De Groot is the deputy editor of Australian Property Investor magazine, www.apimagazine.com.au
Not sure why folks like to live in the city … but for some reason, they do.
Your article brings to mind the Palmerston/Darwin situation. Darwin housing is very expensive, so the answer for a lot of people – buy and live in Palmerston. But, the prices in Darwin still seem to hold their value or go upwards. People seem to resign to the apparent fact … if you want to live in Darwin, you have to pay.
Keep in mind, Palmerston isn’t all that inexpensive either. It just seems more reasonable when compared to Darwin.
They’re releasing a bunch of residential blocks in Palmerston. It will be interesting to see if this has an effect on the Darwin housing market; bring prices downward?
Comment by Dave Ives — May 20, 2011 @ 11:33 pm
I live in Stanmore in Sydney’s inner west. The reason I orignally looked in this area (and surrounding suburbs) was because I like the mid to late 19th century buildings and houses. I like the fact I can walk to the shops, train station, bus, restaurants, rather than having to get in the car. It’s like an urban village – you can do everything here without leaving its borders and without driving. Although densely built (terrace houses, semis, art-deco flats, converted warehouses), it is low rise and there is mixture of land use, which makes it an interesting and vibrant place to live. I also like the multi-cultural community and mixture of interesting people – I have a lovely retired Greek couple in the apartment next door and a gay couple opposite. People are surprisingly friendly with most giving a smile when they pass you in the corridor. Access to the City and other vibrant inner city suburbs is easy (Newtown and Leichhardt are walkable).
I live in a large two bedroom apartment that I bought for $387K back in 2006. I could’ve bought a house in some suburb farther out west for that money at the time, but I would be bored. Street after street of similar looking houses surrounding a Westfield shopping centre. There’s little incentive to walk, because there’s nothing much to look at (for me anyway).
Seems to me that the town planners forgot how to make vibrant communities once the era of the car took over. The only time I use my car is when I head out into boring suburbia to visit friends and relatives out there. I can’t imagine ever moving back out there again. I actually find country towns more interesting, because they usually like a ‘down-sized’ city.
Comment by Dino — May 22, 2011 @ 5:13 pm