What is the future of Australia’s housing going to look like?
How has the pandemic affected our desire to live in each other’s pockets?
My wife and I battle with this constantly even without a pandemic. It’s not really a battle actually, she just tells me where she wants to live and unfortunately for me, she’s a city girl and likes apartment buildings. As for me, I’m like Don Mclean, “City born, but I love the country life”. I love getting out in the garden, mowing the lawn and trimming a few extra kilos off myself by trimming the edges with a hand trimmer. That self-trimming in itself is also a bit of a battle because my neighbour and I then sit down on our newly mown grass to partake of a quiet Sunday afternoon cleansing ale or two……. sometimes three ………sometimes………
So, what about everybody here? Where is your thinking along living with the (next) pandemic?
Could you handle living in a building with communal facilities, in close proximity to hundreds of other people? Would you want to share the same community laundry facilities, your kids using the same playground equipment, using the same lifts and touching the same lift buttons as a myriad of other people? Remembering the total shutdown of a number of Melbourne’s public housing high rise buildings, I’m thinking that is the last place I would want myself or my family living. Add to that the results of a health study some years ago, of what was found on bank ATM buttons (shudder) and I’m thinking that such close living isn’t necessarily a healthy environment.
Early indications are that there is a move away from the city and the close living environment. Recent search activity indicates increased interest in the sea/tree change environment and the suburban, even outer suburban areas are showing signs of increased interest.
Lo and behold! Working from home works!
Whooda thunk it!
In addition to the apparent increased desire of individuals for a more relaxed, more diversified living environment, there is also the seemingly sudden realisation by not only many small businesses, but also the larger corporations, that working from home actually works. The result being that many businesses now accept that staff can work permanently or semi-permanently from home, particularly those in the tech sector or those using new technology. With this realisation comes the reduced requirement for office space and the resultant reduced requirement for living in flats in the CBD close to the office.
It will be very interesting to see how the current emerging patterns morph into 2021, assuming no catastrophic bushfires, floods, droughts or any further pandemics to send us all into another period of uncertainty. Stay tuned into PPBA to see how that unfolds. We’ll be keeping a close eye on that development.
What is your thinking? Are you ok with living where you are constantly required to handle the same door handles, elevator buttons, entry code buttons and stair rails as everyone else in the building, or are you thinking that a bit of self-isolation out on a small hobby farm might be the go?
To my mind, a bit of peace and quiet goes a long way, so my wife and I will continue to ‘discuss’ the merits of city living vs watching the horses graze quietly in the paddocks.
Once you’ve decided on location, be it CBD, suburbs or rural living, PPBA is here to help you get into your home at your price. Regardless of what your choice is, PPBA is not here to tell you where to live, but we do help fit location into your plan.
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