Houses

[Ruby]

Hi

Ive been looking at a few property web sites for houses and Im a little bit surprised they look like OAP bungalows and most look to be made of wood. This is in a range from $285,000 to $300,000 in Hamilton.

Are they all like this !
Don't they have 2 storey homes !
Do they use a 'For Sale' board outside the house !

They also look very 'dated' inside.

Or is it we are expecting to much and need to go higher that $300,000.

Regards

Ruby

[nattydread]

i look through www.realenz.co.nz
Some of the interiors do look a bit ropey but I think thats more to do with the fact that the kiwi's house is a place they go when they're not living whilst in this country some people are so obsessed with their massive houses and all the material things inside it, that they've stopped "living"...

I might be wrong. But I hope not!!


PS, Ruby, I'm not saying you are one of "those" material type people, I hope you dont think that!!

[netchicken]

I like your theory Craig, i hope its right :)

What do you want 2 story homes for?

Most houses here are single story bungalows, 3-4 bedrooms 1-2 living areas, 1-2 bathrooms. They are based historically on the Californian bungalow.

Also I imagine that traditionally the home section has been large enough to spread out horozontally instead of having to go vertical. (the quarter acre pavlova paradise of the 50's).

It costs more to build a house up than across.

Probably for the same reason you never see a house with a basement, just build another room if you need space.

Yes houses are traditionally made of wood, why? Its cheaper and we have heaps of wood, especially pine.

I regularly renovate our old house, (much to the horror of my wife when she comes home to finding another hole in the wall). It was made in the 1920's with plaster and lathe (small sticks nailed onto cross beams) interior walls.

It amazes me how even the cheapest bits of the walls, the lathes - thin sticks nailed to the beams are made of beautiful native Rimu. Wood that now is treasured and prized for furniture.

Also the older houses get harder as they age. I tried stapling black paper on the beams in the roof with a gun, the staples barely entered the wood, it was so hard. When I replaced the rear doorstep, the wood was so hard it was hard to saw in half, and alomost impossible to drive a nail through.

Historically kiwi's are loathe to spend more money than necessary on their houses. For example double glazing is relativly "new" coming into populatiry in the last decade.

Why?

According to builders people didn't want to buy a more expensive house with stuff they could't "see" such as double glazing. They would prefer to spend extra money on a more visible asset.

Also, historically, we had some fo the cheapest electricity in the world, that time has now passed, but insulating the house was never that much of an issue when you could just turn another heater on, or throw another log on the fire.

Staying in germany I was facinated by the quality and complexity of their doors and up to triple glazed windows with curtains on the inside, and levers to lock them into the frame. Also the quality and density of their building frames.

Here you get outside cover - wood, brick, some sort of manufactured panelling. Followed by black paper, or new damp blocking plastic sheeting, followed by batts for insulation, followed by interior plaster board. Houses get slapped up in a matter of weeks to a few months on concrete bases. Often with premade framing just trucked in to the site.

I have to say that I don't think Kiwi's have a "my home my castle" mentality, again this may be changing, but traditionally, houses are / were functional.

However traditionally again we devoted our times to gardening. Now with smaller sections its a declining hobby, but I remember from my childhood the pride people had in large gardens, and home grown vegies. The gardens were always places where people happily threw money.

Its sad that those times are passing, I don't know anyone with a large vegie garden now, we all have little squares to grow some spinach, silverbeet, lettuces, rocket, parsley, and tomatoes. In my childhood our home, in the Hamilton suburbs, had about a 30 feet by 12 feet vegie garden. Now on my small section its down to 6 foot by 6 foot.

So houses themselves were not our pride and joy our egalaterian nature meant that most houses were very similar anyway, so why bother. Standard houses, with standard designs.

Whereas you would get pride filled tours of the gardens if you visited someone in their house. A relative has a farm about 30mins outside of Hamilton, and she had tour buses of gardeners visit hers, they were big things.

[SteveyC]

hehe I think I found a tiny bit to squeeze in as extra advice after that 'comprehensive' report :023:

I believe there made of wood as a safety measure in case of storms or earthquakes. I could be wrong tho. Also don't be alarmed by the 'roof of corregated iron construction' notes. This is the norm also, it took me a while to get my head round it but after a few searches for 'tiles' on the various sites, I resigned myself to 'tin over my head' hehe.

You can get 2 story houses, around the katipi coast they seem to have quite a few, these A-Frame constructions seem quite common. You can also get houses of 'permanent material' this generally means concrete, bricks and/or tiles.
If we ever get there *sob* we intend to build a 2 storey dwelling so we get more garden, embracing the Kiwi outiside is better than in mentality.

From the two storey houses we've seen, they only ever seem to have a garage and/or workshop underneath, and all living is on the top level. Other than that, they appear to be 2 storey due to the land they are built on being a touch uneven!

Genuine 2 storey houses with living upstairs and down seem to be more common amongst the large and expensive houses.

Bungalows give you a much greater feeling of space, and are a lot easier to throw the vacuum cleaner around!!

[Welshgirl]

Like Taffy ever 'throws the vacumn cleaner around' :icon_rolleyes:

[SteveyC]

LMAO of at Welshgirl :icon_lol:

That right, I never 'throw' the vacuum around... I always do a very thorough job! :icon_lol:

[Welshgirl]

No comment

[selchie]

SteveyC is correct about the wood frame house being more safe in earthquake country. Masonry, if "unreinforced" may fall in an earthquake, and concrete can crack. But there are lovely old stone buildings in Otago and possibly other places. I'm also a big fan of reinforced post-and-pier foundations because they are "flexible" during earth movements, rather than rigid concrete slabs.

In 1992, our part of the California coast was hit by three good-sized quakes within 24 hours. An old brick grocers crumbled (no one hurt, thank goodness). Many Victorian houses made of redwood "jumped" off their foundations. The Vics were essentially unharmed, and were soon jacked up onto new foundations.

I am hoping they save a little wood-framed bungalow with a nice garden for us when we get there.