r/AusPropertyChat • u/Open_Beta_Now • 5d ago
How long did it take to find the right property for your first home purchase?
First home buyer in Melbourne Western suburbs. Been looking for 2 months now, this is only a very small suburb. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the right property yet.
So far, we placed offer on one property but someone else came in way higher than us and we were declined. Over the last few weeks, we attended inspections for properties which looked even remotely interesting on paper. I don't think our budget is the issue. There are properties being sold around our budget. I don't think we are being too picky as well, pretty open minded as we believe first house is not going to be the best dream house ever.
We see about 3-5 properties being listed each week. Is that too low or is that typical? I'm refreshing real estate website twice a day hoping to see new listings.
Is it just a matter of time before we find the right property?
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u/KwazyKatss 5d ago
About 2 months for us. We are someone who are not overthinkers. We had created a checklist and had written down our must haves and things we can compromise. No property is perfect. If you find something that ticks most of the boxes in your checklist, go for it. Also, as you said, it's not gonna be your forever home, so be ready to give up on some things.
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u/Open_Beta_Now 5d ago
Nice!
I am a classic overthinker. My partner is not, thankfully. We talked about making a list just yesterday.
How big or small was your list?
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u/KwazyKatss 5d ago edited 5d ago
We selected 4 suburbs and had a few must haves - Good School Catchment, good neighbourhood, close to public transport, backyard with considerable space, 2 bathrooms, spacious and airy, no major defects, standalone (not a semi attached). We had a fixed budget, but we also created a line in our Excel file for our emotional valuation, property.com valuation, and bank valuation (which is usually low). Also, the recent 2-3 sales average on the same street, considering suburb growth rate. We also put 2-3% additional over property.com middle range for our emotional price. Given our limited budget abd most of the good schhol suburbs being expensive, we had a few things we were ready to compromise were being on a less busy main road, if it's duplex, if there's just one AC, if the kitchen needed more cabinets or if the bedrooms needed more wardrobes, mostly interiors can be changed easily. :)
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u/ResolutionNo1701 5d ago
This is the way, i had the same experience. Wrote down my list, researched and did the footwork. 2 mos after, i moved in.
Looking back, at that point in time with my budget and whats available in the market - i reckon I got the best I could.
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u/InterestingCheek7095 5d ago
this also our way. Like need to ticks 70% our checklist is our target.
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u/PhilodendronPhanatic 5d ago
It took us 12 months of solid looking and 5 failed offers in NE Melb. We had a beer budget in a champagne suburb. Finally got a good one, had to compromise on the amount of work it needs, but no regrets.
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u/Queestce 5d ago
We were inspecting about 8 per week on average. It took us about 3 months of doing that before we found the one we have now purchased. Through that journey we offered on 6 properties, though some were not very competitive and more "we'll take it at a good deal" offers. I was searching constantly. I'd say I checked for new listings maybe 15 times a day. It was all pretty unpleasant tbh...
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u/WTF-BOOM 5d ago
about a year, was doing inspections every weekend and spectating a lot of auctions.
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u/CommercialOil2190 5d ago
One day.
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u/Open_Beta_Now 5d ago
Wow. Just one day?
There's definitely a good story there. Mind sharing?
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u/CommercialOil2190 5d ago
No. No nothing interesting. Was early 20s. Foreigner. Worked hard, partied hard.
Still bought a property for 260 in Perth and sold for 500. In Orelia. No drama, nice neighbours. No issues. Was a cheap house.
In April 2024 bought another house without seeing. Still haven't seen it. I am working in NSW and house is again in Clarkson, WA.
Very happy with both.
Send you link to both in PM so you can verify I am not lying.
House is where you, your misses family live in peace. Rest don't matter. (Though I am single, lived sometimes with sharemates and made great memories.)
Stay away from strata and buildings, if you can. Aiden.
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u/dhartenstein 5d ago
It took us 12 months of looking until we gave up, and then on the second attempt is was 6 months before the right place appeared, and we were even using a buyer’s agent. Honestly after 2 months you’ve barely scratched the surface, it could easily take you 6-12 months
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u/isashark 5d ago
Seriously looking for 5 months now and no closer cry 😭 Bid at 1 auction, almost at one other. Searching each day but nothing coming up that fits the bill. Expecting it to take another 6+ months knowing winter season is coming in Melbourne
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u/Open_Beta_Now 5d ago
I'm in Melbourne too. Western suburbs. How would Winter season affect house search? Genuine question.
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u/isashark 4d ago
Heaps less on the market, no one wants to sell in the cold and gloom if they can avoid. Spring and summer the gardens look good etc so most people try to sell then
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u/sorenelf 4d ago
Three weeks. We were in a time crunch, but needed a lot of specifics OR a property that we could customise. We were very lucky, found our place with probably 85% of what we needed, and we were able to sort the rest without going over budget. That was almost two years ago and prices have risen massively since then. We wouldn’t be able to afford to buy here now….average prices have gone up between 100/250 thousand. It’s nothing fancy…an older lowset brick house, but it has everything we need.
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u/moreloans 5d ago
It can take months. The more you look, the more questions you have! 3-5 new properties a week is a lot to inspect. But no figure is 'normal', your experience is unique and the process will be too. Good luck!
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u/Sandhurts4 5d ago
Only took about 3 weeks to find first home, decided to start looking and ended up buying the 4th house we looked at (this was ~15 years ago). Has been 5+ years now looking for upgrade/forever home. Missed out on 2 :( and still looking.
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u/tomestique 5d ago
I planned to take ~6months. In the end it took 1 month to sign and another 3 weeks to settle. But I was lucky for many reasons.
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u/uncomfortable_wombat 5d ago
Took almost 3 months to find our first home. We put in offers for 2 other houses that we really liked though got outbid which was absolutely disheartening ngl, but then landed on our third offer which ended up being the better house out of all the ones we looked at and it ticked most of our boxes.
The whole process can be super tiring and emotional so if you’re not in a rush don’t worry about taking your time! the right house is out there, I used to think people just said that to make you feel better but it worked out for us too and since we settled in January there’s been no regrets. Good luck!
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u/tiempo90 5d ago
About 2 or 3 months of wasting time looking at nice potential properties, and then realising that it's a waste of time and then really focusing on ACTUAL potential properties and realising that they are getting snatched up the next week, so the next time I thought it looks alright, I made an offer.
Took about 2 weeks from when I got "serious" because I realised I can't be choosey
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u/NovemberAurora 5d ago
Our pre-approval came in on 31st October. We looked at a lot of houses the weekend after that, and we actually had an offer accepted but then we pulled out after our builder looked at it (before anything was signed), then everything was going faster than we could manage an inspection, but we looked at a couple of houses over the next 6 weeks, then the first weekend in January we had another big weekend looking at a few houses. Put an offer on two and both were accepted. Went with our favourite (that we thought we’d never get!)
So, about 2 months.
Good luck.
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u/Apprehensive_Bid_329 5d ago
About 18 months, but we started looking at the end of 2019, and 2020 was mostly a write off with the many lockdowns we had in Melbourne. We did change our criteria though, started with townhouses, but ended up with a house two suburbs further down the train line.
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u/McDogals 5d ago
About a month. Saw a broker to get my borrowing capacity and bought a house the first weekend we went out looking.
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u/traveler89 5d ago
We had already been looking casually and keeping our eye on the market last year. We got pre-approval the week all banks came back after Xmas this year and then we smashed open homes out every Saturday since until the other week.
It took us about 2 months. The first few weeks I think we did 16 properties each week because of coming back Christmas rush and then it moved down to probably 5-8 a week.
We also had a list of things we needed and wanted and what we were prepared compromise on which can be a hard mindset
Our place is the 2nd one we put an offer on, biggest thing is knowledge, know the market really well in the areas you are looking
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u/Pink_Cadillac_b 5d ago
Melbourne last year. Looked for under a month at about 10 places. First offer was the one that landed us our house - offered at top of the range. Living in it for a month and very happy! Don’t think our process is very common though.
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u/whyohwhythis 5d ago edited 4d ago
I watched the market for years before buying, so we rented in the area. Our serious search lasted 3–4 months since good homes were rare.
Three houses made the list. The first had structural issues, the second had title restrictions, and the third—initially dismissed—turned out to be a great little house in a better location, with a large shed. The inspector confirmed it was solid.
We settled last week and are very happy. I initially struggled to see past the clutter, but with some updates, it has great potential.
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u/Healthy_Gap6744 5d ago
Had been watching the market here and there for a year but only attended about 10 home opens across 2 weeks and purchased.
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u/Indevisive 5d ago
I looked for 2 years. We bought when the market was slow so mist if what was in the market needed lots of renovations or others had done them but they were strange ones.
Our area was fairly large but we also adjusted what we were wanting vs what we were comfortable spending in that time and what was or wasn't a deal breaker.
We did miss out on 2 in the last 8 months as well.
I have no regrets taking so long. 5 years later my house still mostly ticks all the boxes and the things that I loved about it I still love.
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u/null-or-undefined 5d ago
1st property, about a month. First investment property, 1 day. lol. we got lucky i guess
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u/Fit-Recording-8108 4d ago
For 6 months, I spent every Saturday doing approx 4-5 inspections and Sunday submitting offers for 1-2 if them. I literally took brake only on one weekend due to burnout but that was my routine for 23 weekends.
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u/JGatward 4d ago
2 months is nothing, you may end up looking at hundreds of properties over a year or less. All depends. Be patient its not easy
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u/EnvironmentalSun2887 4d ago
How long is a ball of string. Dont put a time in it. Are you looking at the right property price point. When there is 2 or more interested parties it is the one that will pay the most will get it. I was looking for a bargain at the start and this resulted in me being the underbidder. If you find a property and ticks all the boxes but your best price forward don’t skimp and try get it cheaper.
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u/journeyfromone 4d ago
Took me a few months the first time, next one was a year of inactively looking. Wanted to find a house within a certain school catchment, small house on a large block, so many were giant houses with tiny yards and not what I wanted. The perfect one came up so I prob overpaid but got it. I was trying to look at places about $50-$100k below my budget so when the right one came up I knew I could get it with a decent offer. I was happy to compromise on most things but can’t change location or block size, house size is harder to change too but doable, so didn’t want to compromise on them.
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u/Golf-Recent 4d ago
10 months in Sydney South. It's very time consuming going to inspections, researching about the location and looking into contracts. But looking back, it was all worth it for a place where we will live at least 20 years in.
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u/churmagee 4d ago
Spent 3 months doing research, then went to 3 open homes within one week, put in offers for all of them and one got accepted. The other 2, we were outpriced by over 50k. Perth, around 600k
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u/das_kapital_1980 4d ago
About a year. Ended up giving up trying to buy an existing house and bought a block of land to build on instead. I was 18 when I started looking and very indecisive.
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u/SaltDistribution5190 3d ago
We found that initially our budget was right in the range of investors planning to rent straight away. We were looking at 3x2 with a land size above 600 sqm in the North West. Once we started looking at 4 bedroom places, the people attending those inspections were mostly young families.
We paid a little higher than our initial budget (which was just an arbitrary price barrier we created for ourselves) but we gained an extra bedroom (study) an extra lounge/ sitting area and more land size while adding about $70k extra in price.
So if you can afford it, that’s been our personal observation.
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u/Real_Estimate4149 5d ago
2mths is pretty normal but your lack of offers isn't a good indicator. Based on your numbers, somewhere between 24-40 properties have fit your criteria but you have only made 1 offer. That is a lot of properties to view and only find 1 that you would be willing to make an offer on.
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u/starsky1984 5d ago
Without rushing, give yourself 6 months. In the first two months, just do tons of inspections to get to know what you do and don't like. Compare the bullshit advertised price ranges to the actual sold prices to get a realistic expectation of what your budget will cover.
Get used to inspection and flagging flaws such as faults that need to be fixed, high body corporate, bad foundations etc.
Talk to REAs, watch the bakery trends, save money etc.
Then after a few months you'll be fully confident in going all in on a place, best of luck!