The Property PlaybookHouse and land packages are a popular option for people who want more control over the look of their new home. But what does that process look like and what do you need to know before you start on that journey? On this episode, Jessica Ricci is joined by Ellen Nurse, a New Homes Consultant from Homebuyers Centre. Ellen explains how house and land packages work and what's involved, so you can make an informed choice.
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The advice shared on The Property Playbook is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. The property Playbook exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS, TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs. Victoria Devine and The Property Playbook are authorised representatives of Money Sherpa PTY LTD ABN - 321649 27708, AFSL - 451289.
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Hello, and welcome back to The Property Playbook, the podcast where we take you from A to V of all things property. My name is Jessica Ricky and hopefully one day I will have my own home. But until then, I'm bringing you guys on the journey where I talk to some of my favorite experts to learn a little bit more about the process. Today, I have the beautiful Allen Nurse, who is a new homes consultant from Home Buyer Center, which is a building company here in Victoria and across a couple of other states as well. Allen, Welcome to the show. Thank you, thank you for joining me. It's so exciting. Because none of our team have any experience in the house and land space, we thought it only made sense to bring in an expert who could take us through the process. I've got a whole heap of questions here from the community to ask you, and I am so excited on a personal level to pick your brain. Perfect, let's jump into it. I'll start off by kind of starting at the start. Can you tell me a little bit about what the process of building via a house and land package, what that looks like. Yeah?
Absolutely so, I guess it all depends on firstly and foremost what building you're speaking with. So every builders will change on their inclusions, their process, their time frames, etc. But when speaking about home buyers Center in particular, like we're set up to cater towards your first home buyer or your downsize or investor. So the process we follow and from our experience that the best way to start is finance first, and that's really speaking with a construction loan specialist and getting an idea of you know, what sort of title, time frame works for you, what sort of budget you're working tools, and what really works for your particular situation, because as you know, everyone's situation is completely different.
Yeah.
Once we get that guardance from our brokers or our construction loan experts, it gives us tailored advice to kind of go out and find you the best solution. And then that's packaging up. I guess house and land packages, so you know you're fixed and final price gives you the guidance to go back to your broker, get an idea if it works, and yeah, just just sets it up to give you the best outcome and to be successful.
Yeah, amazing. You're talking about packaging up house and land. So I think for a lot of people when we think about house and land or land and house is what we call it here on this podcast, because sometimes the land comes first. Do you have the option of bringing your own land? So if someone's maybe invested in some land in an area that they want to live in but they're waiting for it to title, can they come to someone like you guys, and then just put the house on it, or do they need to do it all together via the build up.
No, So a lot of people out there will have already purchased land and they don't know, you know, where to start or how to get started. So they come to us, They walk through our beautiful displays, fall in love with a particular home, and what we then like to do is get fixed pricing for them. So there's a lot of variables when it comes to a block. So what we want to do is check you feel your fall, all the levels and all of the engineering reports especially, and make sure it's a safe block to build on and that we actually can build the design you're looking at, because you know you might run into things like retaining roles that could affect the size of the home you're putting on your block. Yeah, what we do really well at home buys is we give you all the information up front, so you completely across everything, so there's just no nasty surprises.
That's the thing that a lot of people are worried about. And something that came up when we put out and asked for questions is people saying, oh my gosh, like, do the price has change? Do things?
You know?
Are there unexpected things? Because I think there have been people who have had bad experiences, which is kind of no matter what you're doing, there's people who have purchased homes directly and had a bad experience, and I think a lot of people are worried about those kind of hidden costs. So you share all of that upfront, so you go into it kind of knowing what that cost is going to look like absolutely.
Like we know, especially with first home buyers, you've got so many unknowns. There's so many moving parts to building. So what we want to do is give you peace of mind first and foremost, and that typically relates back to finance.
One hundred percent.
So as soon as you've.
Got your finance all sorted, it can be like that moment of oh, like yeah, peaceful this, like you know what your buying is achievable, you know exactly what you're paying up front, and just having that peace of mind will just help you sleep at night.
Yeah, incredible. Talking about land, you mentioned a whole bunch of words for that. To be honest, I've never heard of when we're looking at buying land other than things like easements. What should people be considering? So if they haven't purchased it yet, is there anything they can look out for that maybe makes a block more ideal?
Yeah, definitely read into you developers, see what, you know, kind of work they're doing, what amenities they're offering within a particular estate, because you know it'll change completely in terms of price of where you're looking, what you're close to. When you're looking at land, I guess in more detail you want to check things like retaining roles, easements, like you've mentioned orientation of the block as well, like if you want a sunny backyard, you might yeah, you might want a north facing g rear, or you know, you might hate the sun and you want to change the orientation. But some of the bigger things about you know, fill and fall or just some of that uncertainty around soil.
Type what is feeling for No, no, no, that's okay.
So basically the developer will come in, they will flatten the block and they'll make it appear flat. But that fill or it's a bit easy when I draw a picture, sorry, but that fill on the block is what we call disturb soil. And what we've got to do is a build is make sure we're drilling into it and hitting the undisturbed soil and boring the slab on top so it doesn't affect the foundation and move over time.
So you want to be like dense. What you put on top is like solid.
For sure, So we don't want to be building on top of soil that's going to move, you know, over time. And that's just again setting up your foundation, which is the slab the longevity of your home.
Yeah, that does sound very important because you don't want to move in and then have it all shift around on you a few months later. You mentioned before the varying locations and prices. Somebody wants to know wider house and land package prices very so much suburb to suburb for the same design.
Yeah, So, I guess the easiest way to put it is, you'd expect to pay a bit more for land in Richmond than you would in you know, in an area like Berrick in the southeast, as you would expect with anything. So it's always location, location, location, So I guess what drives pricing.
Is is the land.
Yeah.
Again talking about the states and developers, it's what amenities they're offering, what transport access they're offering, what you know, school zones they're in. There's multiple factors. But the best way, I guess, especially if you're looking for land and shopping for land, come and speak to us where the professionals will help guide you.
We'll have a chat to you.
We're not just gonna, you know, one box fits ole solution. Yeah, We'll figure out what's important and will provide you with a relative solution.
Yeah.
Yeah.
One of the things I think that is really intimidating as a first home by myself and someone who has looked into building and has looked into kind of all my different options. Is it is a very involved process. It feels like building a house, and it's hard to know when it is and isn't appropriate to ask someone for help. So, for example, I walked through a home by a center build and that's how we met and how we got you on the pod. But I walked through one and the person there was so lovely and I had heaps of questions, and I wanted to get that kind of final costing because as you said, it varies by suburban location and facade and all of these different things. But it's a very lengthy process, I suppose for someone on the other side to put that all together and cost it up. Is it okay for people to get in touch with a new home consultant and get something costed up, even if they're not entirely there. So if they're looking at land and they go, oh, I think that I might want to purchase this block, but I want to make sure that I can afford it and the home. Is it okay for us to ask people that or is it kind of just too much work?
Oh my gosh, No, absolutely not.
As a new homes consultant myself, there's nothing that gives me more pleasure than helping someone understand if they can actually achieve it or not. And when looking at first home uys in particular, like typically they think they're so much further off than what they actually are. All it's about is getting the information to them, making them feel comfortable in their decision, and giving the finance you're backing to know that they can actually achieve what they're looking at. That's the peace of mind you get. But you'll only get it when you know the final price.
Right, Yeah, one hundred of And there's so many factors. I didn't realize how many little things and we'll talk about this a little bit later, but how many little changes or details there are that cost money.
Yeah, and there's so much Like I said earlier, like there's moving parts to building. Until you know everything, you're not sure if it is the right decision for you, So come and speak to us. We'll get you fixed pricing. It's not as hard as people think. It only takes us a couple of days to fix a price on a particular block. We've got amazing experts in our office that will look at blocks of land, fix your site cost, give us a good breakdown of what's actually involved in preparing the land for the home design you've chosen. And once you know all that information, we just refer back to our construction loan experts. And like I said, it just gives you peace of mind. It gives you that moment to kind of take it breath and go oh, for what I'm doing is completely achievable. I know what I have to do to get in and I know I can do it.
Yeah, And I think that's the most stressful part, right It is like knowing can I can? I not. It's not like where you see generally just a set price on an established property. So I think it is really important that people do feel confident talking to someone and asking those questions. Yeah, somebody else has asked are their low cost options available to build? And I guess this comes from something that I have heard from actually people when I've been talking about my own journey and talking about the fact that I was looking into building, and for everyone listening at home, if you don't know, the reason I looked into building was because I'm really fussy and I wanted something that suited what I wanted. But so many people say building is so expensive, like you, you know, for this half the price, you could maybe not half the price, that's an exaggeration, but for significantly less you could purchase something established and you could renovate, or you could do whatever. They're lower cost options available if you do want to explore building.
Yeah, there's definitely lower cost options. So with Home Buyers Center in particular, we're targeted towards getting first home buyers into the market. So we understand that right now, affordability is the biggest barrier.
So what we.
Offer you projects like town homes or medium density, so our available options it's a five percent deposit, so a really small deposit to get started, and then when you're working with our experts in finance.
Will work with you towards that deposit.
We'll speak to developing partners, we'll figure out if we can get you sort of payment options to get in. But again going back to that guidance, it's about speaking to your trusted building partners and helping them get you there.
Okay, and talk me through townhouses a little bit. So they're obviously generally like the two story on the slightly smaller block. What makes them a really good option for FoST home buyers.
Affordability, absolutely so. Our town homes are typically in the best locations in the best of states. We've got some that are park facing. You're typically getting a larger home than what you would in comparison to house and land, and you're saving a significant price. The beauty with our town homes or our mediimtensity product is that they're not under any body corporate, so you're not paying additional money in insurances or anything like that.
It's your own home and it's a big home. Yeah. Yeah, that's the main thing.
Incredible Already, Well, let's head to a really quick break and when we come back, I want to talk to you a little bit more in depth about what the process of actually designing and building the home looks like. Don't go anywhere already, guys, Welcome back today. I am chatting with Allan Nurse from Home Buyer Center to learn all about the process of house and land or as you know, we like to call it land and house and what that kind of looks like, particularly for someone like me who's a first home buyer. Now, Alan, one of the questions that came up a lot is how much flexibility is there when buying a house and land design? So I think you know, if you build with an independent builder, you can control every little detail, whereas a lot of the time with house and land packages it's relatively set. So people want to know can they customize the colors, can they move walls or change fixtures? How much room is there to be a little creative.
We love creative people, but obviously with land and home packages as you like to call them, there is limited flexibility. But again it goes back with what builder you're speaking with and also what developer the packages in. So with us, we'll let you pick your own colors, we'll let you customize the floor plan. But again, how much do we let you customize? We've got I guess forty two different home design options and four to five designs from within each floor plan.
Yep, I think that gives you.
That's a lot.
Yeah, it's over two hundred. There's definitely room to make changes. And then if there's anything on top of that that you want to change. I always say, just ask the question. Yeah, ask the question and your builder will try.
And help you.
Yeah. I remember when I was chatting with the consultant that I was having initial conversations with. It was really interesting because we were looking at a particular block of land and he said to me, oh, by the way, because of the orientation of the property, we recommend just flipping the whole four plan. Like people would do that and you get better lot. And I was like, I didn't even know that that was a thing that was an option. So it's cool to know you can do that. I guess it is obviously really specific to the design and the land and stuff like that. But is there the possibility for people to if they said, oh, I'd rather this room be a little bit bigger and the one next work be a little bit smaller. Is that sometimes an option being able to make those small adjustments by shifting a wall out ever so slightly, as long as you're not changing big structural things.
Yeah. So most builders won't like to change your wet areas. Yeah, but if you're just extending a room out, given that the land allows for it, we can change. We can change to the floor plants lightly. It's just about asking the question. We go to our office and we ask the question, and if it's achievable, why not, We'll look at it.
I love that it's like you're on our side, which is really nice.
Yeah, for sure, Well, we want you to have you know, the perfect home, like we're building first home buyers homes. Yeah, we want to make homes happen. So give us all the questions, give us all the you know changes, and we'll just try and make the best solution come true.
Oh that's so nice to hear. A lot of people have been asking how challenging or time consuming is the process of building from scratch as a first home buy because speaking for myself, I have no idea what I'm doing, Like, it is very overwhelming, which is why I'm hosting this podcast and hopefully helping some other people feel a bit more comfy. But it seems like potentially the process of building a house is very involved, Like there's lots of little details and like wolves and land and all of these things. How difficult is it for somebody who's got no idea what they're doing.
Yeah, building can be difficult, It can be hard, definitely can be challenging. But what we like to do is just simplify the whole process and make it as easy as possible. And by doing that, it's holding your hand and guiding you.
Through each step.
So obviously some people will be more particular than others, and with that we just have to adapt ourselves to help them through it. So, if it's with colors selection, we'll take you through a color showroom, will help you with colors, We've got expert guidance from the girls from the block. Yeah, so we've got the professionals, like, we've got all the experts to help you, and that just makes it easier instead of going to a million different parties, whether it's external finance, external solicitors, conveyances, etc. Were the one stop shop. We've got everyone there that's set up to help you, and that's just to make the experience as enjoyable as possible for beginners.
Yeah, talking about colors, this is something I had a conversation with one of the girls in the office about this very recently. How do people figure out what looks good together? And this is probably a personal question as well, but you walk through these display homes and they look really beautiful, and they've obviously been put together by experts and interior designers. How do people kind of figure out what their vibe is because it feels like when you're putting down a tile or you're painting a wall, it's a very final decision and as someone like me who gets very overwhelmed, that's tough and scary. Is it something that you know you see a lot of people struggle with and can your experts kind of help provide guidance on interior feeling as well? We had an interior designer on the show earlier in the season, the beautiful Alison Lewis, and she's so good at what she does and I remember saying to her, I just could never do that, And I feel like walking into a color showroom would be just like mind bogglingly overwhelming for me. Is there, like you say that you have those experts kind of there and available to help. Are they able to guide you on creating I suppose the feeling that you want to have in your home?
Yeah, definitely. So currently we've got six color schemes and are hand selected by the experts Yen Lessandra the Twins, and what you'll have from that is the flexibility to customize from within each color scheme. The beauty of having the color schemes is they're put in all of our display home. So what you're actually walking through in real life is what you can have in your own home, and you'll be able to see it furnished. You'll be able to see, you know, and touch and feel the splash back and all the pretty feature tiles, and that's what we put in our home. So what you see in display is genuinely what we give you.
That's really good because I remember walking through a display home once and I asked the consultant who was there and wasn't a home buyers one obviously, I said, oh, like how much? I just kind of assumed it was an upgrade because it's a beautiful tile, so how much would it be to add this in to the existing plant or whatever? And they're like, oh, we don't off of that, and I was like, why is it here? Yeah, why is it there? And it's just to give you a demonstration of what you could do. And I was like, but I can't exactly.
And that's and that's where first home buyers get super confused and, like I said, super overwhelmed. And that's why, you know, it's a different experience when you're going through someone that's set up to guide you with you.
Know, finance, land home.
Colors like we help you with everything. We know how stressful it can be, so our goal is to just take all the pressure off you, absorb all the stress so you can actually enjoy the process and experience.
That sounds really nice. Can you talk me through a little bit what is and isn't included in a build? Because I think a lot of people, including me, when I first started looking, I'll put my hand up here, go oh, everything like a house and land package, it's all done like you buy it. But that's actually what a turnkey property is. Not all house and land packages are that. So what generally is and isn't included because then I guess those are additional costs that we have to be factoring into our price.
Yeah, for sure.
So I guess if you jump online and you're inquiring on some house and land or home and land packages or whatever it is, what you want to be keeping an eye out for are things like fencing and landscapings that most things builders won't include. Yeah, but the key things that you want to make sure are included, especially if you're a first home buyer, are things like your floor coverings and your driveway because they're realistically what you need to get started. So any building you're speaking with, just make sure if there's any advice, those two things are included. So, yeah, your driveway and your floor coverings.
The floor one is actually really funny because I remember speaking to somebody and sorry, I'm just like totally interjecting my whole personal experience into this episode, but I remember talking to somebody and they pointed out the fact that floor coverings weren't included, and I was like, what do you mean the house that I'm building doesn't have flaws? Like it just blew my mind that that was one of those details. I think something else that I've heard heating and cooling isn't necessarily always included as well, Is that right?
Yeah? Correct, So just make sure you know what's important to you is in their standard inclusions, and then anything that's not, just make sure you're asking them to put it in so you know exactly how much it's going to cost you before you, you know, go and put pen to paper or you know, sign your life away or anything like that. You just want to make sure you've got a full understanding, full transparency of what's actually going in your home.
Yeah, and what kind of additional costs do people need to be factoring in beyond the advertisedbal price.
A lot of first home buyers will kind of come into displays, especially and ask the question of, you know, what's the base price of this home? And that question can be extremely misleading, especially if you're in a display village where there's you know, ten twenty homes and you just door to door, what's the base price?
I made that mistake.
Yeah, and it's common, and it's super super common. But every builder on the street will give you a different base price, for example, twenty five square home, and that difference in price could be you know, site costs not being fixed or included, your estate guidelines, not being factored in, your council costs, your bushfire provisions. So I'm probably throwing out all these random.
Yeah, can you talk me through what some of those things are, because I think a lot of people who are looking for the first time wouldn't have an understanding of what they are, let alone what to look out for.
Yeah, for sure. So every block of land will be in an estate, and every estate will have a different guideline to follow. So where I'm currently working in Cloverton, a state, they require things like high ceilings as a requirement for this state.
That's so interesting.
Yeah, so something like that.
If that's not factored into the pricing up front, you'll be finding out about it later.
And if you're not finding it about it early, you can't actually, yeah, exactly.
And to build in the estate, the developer requires high ceilings, so you have to have it otherwise you won't get your permits. So the earlier and sooner you can find out about these costs, the better because it will just give you, I guess, the peace of mind one knowing you've included everything that you have to and two it works with your finance options.
Yeah, what about you mentioned bushfire? What's that?
Yeah, so bushfire provision.
This is more so when you're looking at blocks of land that is titling later or that's titling later, council will deem it.
Basically, it's a big grassland.
And it's a bushfire zone, so if anything catches a light, the whole thing's probably gonna burn.
Once it gets closer to.
Tidle, council will kind of reassess the area and see if it's still in a bushfire zone. If it's not, that'll be lifted and we'll give you what we call the bushfire provision back as a credit. What the bushfire cost is is basically all the materials that as a builder we have to change to comply with a bushfire zone. So that's in seat of using you know, plastic fly screens, will have to use steel mesh fly screens. Okay, Yeah, so just little changes in materials.
And is that the same for flooding as well.
Yeah, so like soil type, any sort of you know, natural kind of thing will have to factor in for the build. Yeah, and that'll affect your site cost, it will affect your variations. But again that's just why you want to be working with the builder that is looking into every single thing, doing their due diligence up front, Yeah, and just giving you that final price before you know, paying a deposit or locking anything in.
Yeah. Due diligence is one of our favorite phrases on this podcast. We cannot say do your due diligence loudly enough from the rooftops. Speaking of the building process, though, there's a lot of I guess media kerfuffle right now about the cost of materials because inflation combined with you know, the backlog of imports and COVID and all of these different factors seem to have culminated in this really annoying little bubble where materials are just becoming more and more expensive. So somebody asked, can prices change during a build? For example, if inflation causes the cost of materials to go up, will the overall cost of my build increase?
Yeah, so goes back to who you're building with. Prices absolutely have been changing in the last couple of months or last twelve months, I should say they've changed significantly. That's why, depending on who you've chosen as a builder, you've either signed a fixed price contract.
Or a variable price.
Okay, so if prices go up, you just want to make sure the contract you've signed is a genuine fixed price and you're not going to be affected by any of that.
And where do people, if they are looking into a particular builder, where do they find that information regarding whether or not it is in fact a true fixed or a variable contract.
You've got to read the fine prints on.
You could not the answer I wanted to.
Yeah, I know it is tricky because a lot of builders will tell you it's a fixed price and then you'll you'll read, unfortunately, the small print underneath and it'll say subject to a bunch of different things.
Yeah.
So yeah, just just read your.
Contracts, read this fine print, and just make sure you're asking questions.
Yeah, and that's something I think that you potentially could talk to your broker about as well, if you're going through that process, or if you have somebody else on your home buying team. Definitely worth asking. But reading the front print is probably a very good idea when you're buying something so expensive.
For sure, especially if you're dealing with, like we were saying, a construction home specialist.
They'll be able to tell you.
They'll point out all the flags in your paperwork if you're dealing with one of those.
Amazing.
The last question that I have alan for you before I let you go is what should people do if they are considering house and land packages? Who should they speak to? Where should they start? What is your best advice for people basically exactly like me?
Yeah, just do your research online. Do you do diligence in checks, reputations, everything. In this current market, it's obvious there's bad media everywhere on the building industry. Do your research and just don't pick your builder by design or price. That's my biggest thing. Pick a builder on reputation, experience, in quality. You want to make sure that they're going to be there to build your home. If you guys are looking in Victoria, come and speak to me. My name's Ellen. I work for the Home Bias Center. We're Australia's second largest builder and we're set up to guide you through getting into home ownership.
Incredible. We'll pop all of Allen's information in the show note if anyone does want to reach out and have a chat to her. But I think that's everything. Thank you so much for answering what feels like a million and one questions from me. Okay, just before we head off, let's quickly wrap the boring but important stuff. The advice shed on the Property Playbook is generally in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. The Property Playbook exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or a financial decision. And that's all for today, guys, so thank you so much for joining me, and I'll chat to you in the next episode. Bye bye,
