Grange, Henley beach west beach

Hi all,

does anybody live in or know these areas am just trying to get a bit of input on the areas,

good, bad, family oriented, expensive

any useful info greatly appreciated

also if anyone has a 3-4 bed house to rent up that way from the 10th of March give me a shout(worth a ask;))

thanks

gary

All nice areas. West Beach probably the slightly cheaper area and Henley probably the busier area with more going off. My brother in law and his wife have lived in Henley Beach for years and are really happy there. All areas will be cheaper further back from the beach than right on the sea front but none of them are the cheapest places to buy a house. No idea about rental prices but have a look on realestate.com.au for an idea. Grange beach is our favourite for a quick trip to the beach. There is a lovely cafe at the beach that is always busy and does nice ice cream.

We started in a rental in Lockleys and our children went to Henley Beach PS. It's a very convenient location - easy into the CBD, easy to the beaches, easy shopping, lots going on all around as you would expect in a city. The Torrens Linear Park is an easy bike ride from the city to the beach (or the other way round).

We moved out because we didn't want to live in a city but it was a great place to start out in and get our bearings.

Nice area. Not my personal taste (beach suburb living) but many are happy along the coast

One thing to consider, it may be affordable to rent in but property sells round there for a fair chunk and may not be affordable when the time comes, depending on the buying budget. That can mean then having to leave the area and local friends etc. And possibly change schools depending on how far away you move. We started off living in Glenelg but after a few months it became clear it wasn't somewhere we wanted to settle long term. It was pricey although we could have bought somewhere small probably. We moved about a 20 minute drive away up the hill when we bought after 7 months. Meant changing schools also as I did a term of driving to the old school and it wasn't fun. So we moved our son 2 terms sooner to the school in our new area. Never looked back with the change of schools but for some kids it can be hard going if they do have to change.

Property for rent tends to get snapped up pretty quick if its decent (and probably if its crap too) so I'd suggest going in to or getting in touch with local real estate agents, talking to them, telling them what you are looking for etc and hopefully something will crop up they could send your way. Else its relying on realestate.com.au and domain and other sites and checking a few times a day to see if anything new is listed and getting to the first (and often only) open and putting in an application on the spot if you really like it.

Thanks for help guys

, time is flying in for us at the moment trying to sort so much,

i was really hopeing to find our new home area rent get settled for a year or two and then buy there if all good so to not move the kids schools out there

but am thinking this is very unlikely,

am coming to the conclusion I would have to be very lucky to figure it all out from the other side of world as I have been on realestate.com.au most nights looking at all sorts of places but areas are really hard to judge on line,

We aren't going until September, but completely share your pain.

Hi Gary,

We have been here around 6 weeks now and would stress that it is really difficult to judge where you will want to set up your first home. In the UK, i had an idea of where we would want to live, had looked at schools and rents etc. When we arrived, within a couple of days we had ruled that area out completely.

We have decided on a few areas now that we like that we hadn't considered back before we set off. It's also worth stressing that we have viewed lots of properties and a fair number of them are not necessarily accurately portrayed by their photos on websites! (some clearly taken a long while ago) Plus many agents will not consider an application without you having viewed the property.

I completely get where you are coming from in terms of wanting to get the right area from the kick off and not move schools, but in our very limited experience so far, it can be a huge benefit to try a short term rental to get a feel for an area first. Even just a couple of weeks can help get to grips with places you feel you could or could not set up home.

We arrived during the long school holidays which has given us some breathing space but, and this is obviously only our opinion, we wanted to get the house/area right first, especially if the schools we then looked at in those areas are zoned.

For what its worth, if we were going for a coastal suburb then i really love the areas that you are looking at too . Perhaps if you are looking to arrive outside of the holiday/festival season you could pick a short term rental up at a reasonable rate? Good luck with it all though!

Thanks for help guys

, time is flying in for us at the moment trying to sort so much,

i was really hopeing to find our new home area rent get settled for a year or two and then buy there if all good so to not move the kids schools out there

but am thinking this is very unlikely,

am coming to the conclusion I would have to be very lucky to figure it all out from the other side of world as I have been on realestate.com.au most nights looking at all sorts of places but areas are really hard to judge on line,

Most people don't secure a long term rental before they move over. The norm is to find some kind of short term rental for a few weeks at least so you can have some time to look round and check areas out. Although if you have a specific area in mind it can be tricky to locate a short term rental in the area but if you are set on Henley Beach/Grange way it should be possible as its a popular beach suburb.

I know of a few people who started off in one area that was fine price wise to rent but when it came to buying meant they could not afford to buy in the same area so had to move elsewhere. Its not uncommon.

If you want a beach suburb for the beach reason then all the city ones are going to be pricey to buy in. Brighton, Glenelg, Henley, Grange, the price will be steeper than if you went further south down the coast to places like Hallet Cove, Port Noarlunga etc. Prices do vary wildly in these suburbs too, depending on the location and house etc. Buying right on the beach in those suburbs does tend to be pricey too. Chances are you won't have a direct beach view in any of them unless you are spending a heap so it'll be a short drive in the car to get to the beach from much of the suburb (especially in the day or when its hot, cause walking would see you crispy or melt a bit). Can't really comment much on the northern beach suburbs as don't spend much time on them. I work in Port Adelaide and West Lakes sometimes and while I like Port Adelaide to visit I'd never live there. West Lakes I find very meh. Semaphore seems fine though I have only been there once or twice but for me personally its too far up in that northern corner though many are happy there and settled well Its personal preference and all that end of the day.

What are you wanting from an area? Is there a work reason, commute, schooling, other facilities, all of those things? Lots of areas could tick your boxes and once here, what you liked the look of in pictures etc you may not in person and you'll find somewhere else you actually do prefer.

Hi thanks for input guys yes sorry short term for first few weeks is the plan, the area is the worry, I guess what I want is somewhere easy commute to Regency park for work and good area for kids schools/ clubs not to far from the sea without a expensive price tag, lol cheers snifter semaphore looks great

I was just writing a reply about staying north of Henley Beach Road and looking at the suburbs of Findon, Underdale, Brooklyn Park etc for easy access to Regency Park and thinking they'd be more affordable when it comes to house buying but then I did a quick Real Estate look and realised I'd forgotten just how much property costs up there in the city and remembered that was one of the reasons we'd moved out. Obviously I have no idea on your budget or what you'd be looking for in a house but there wasn't much choice under $400,000.

On the other hand, like Snifter said it's not too terrible to move area and schools after a short-ish while; we promised our children that when we moved out of the city after a year we wouldn't move again until they'd finished school so that they had a sense of security but you might find your perfect spot and be happy to carry on renting so you can stay there - and plenty of people obviously live up there, so it's all down to circumstance and choice. I understand it's a worry though when you're moving to the other side of the world - we started off house sitting to help us both financially and to get an idea of the city.

We live in West Lakes (meh!!) and really love it. We live next to the lake and have a kayak that we just walk from garage to water, when the kids want to go to the beach and we dont want to hit the real beach we just walk to the lake beach. We;ve recently been keeping a look out for house in fulham gardens area (as we want daughter to get a place at Fulham North School) but are struggling to leave the lakeside living!

I have several friends who live in Grange and that's a lovely area with a train line into the city and of course the great beach and foreshore there.

Good luck

Sounds great am really torn between the fear of not knowing places and the excitement of seeing new places, less then a month to go