Home.

The right home rarely walks through your door. You need to seek it out. Home finding is easier when you have a guide beside you.

Transforming one life at a time. Getting you to where you need your home to be.

My role as a guide, as a real estate advocate is to get you into your new home with minimal stress, minimal fear of a wrong decision, and as much avoidance of buying a lemon as is possible.

The main reasons why people choose to work together with me as their real estate guide.

Time poor
Purchased your last home a decade ago
Fear of buying a lemon
Fear of buying the wrong home, it costing you money to fix, or money and aggravation to go through the whole selling and buying process – again!
It’s a solo decision, and you want independent, expert advice

Home. Being Time Poor

Time poor, working full time with demanding jobs, young families, a strict budget and criteria and goals to achieve with their next home. The search for a new home is fun until it becomes repetitious and you can’t find the time to view homes before they sell, and when you do view them, they are nothing like the photographs or marketing copy have suggested,

Searching for your next home becomes a problem rather than fun. It’s on your TO DO list but keeps getting pushed further down the list as life intrudes. My role in this scenario is to guide the search, viewing each home, photographing or videoing, eliminating the unsuitable, and chatting about the possibles. My clients viewed the possibles (and sometimes the unsuitable), until they found the home they wanted to pursue. Changing their minds was okay because that’s what happens – buying a home is a BIG, emotional decision and should not be taken lightly.

Together we researched a few, we discussed the research findings, I undertook further real estate data research, using my checklists to be certain before we undertook negotiations. Negotiations mean clarifying your position, what you want, what your limits are, and how do they tie in with the sellers wants, limits, and expectations. It’s a perfect scenario when both sides meet and agreements are struck.

Bidding at auction, sometimes we stood on the periphery, just watching. The house they thought they loved, they realised didn’t meet their needs. It was a lovely place, beautifully styled, they needed to dig deeper, concentrate on buying the right place, not a lemon, and not one that really didn’t suit.

We give it time. Buying a home is different than buying a property investment. Home is emotion, gut, and head whereas property investment is more about the numbers stacking up. I love being involved in home buying and home selling.

Home. Buying after a long time

1975, the last home that you bought.

1985, the last home that you bought.

1999, the last home that you bought.

It may seem like yesterday but 1975 is now 50 years ago!! Yes, worthy of 2 exclamation marks!

The housing market has changed dramatically in that time. It has changed a great deal even since I first ventured into working in real estate in 2002. Prices have changed, interest rates have changed, marketing has exploded in this digital age, real estate agents have become slicker, more educated about building rapport, how to manipulate (hm, manoeuvre?) both buyers and sellers. Legislation has changed in a big way.

Where does that leave you? You are well versed in life experience, you know a fool when you see one, but you still have to deal with real estate agents when buying or selling. The agent has no compunction about telling you that your home is outdated, your furniture needs to go, and even that your home is likely to be demolished. Ouch!

Working through selling and buying, buying and selling, doing both simultaneously is a minefield of decisions. Great if you have a genuinely knowledgeable family member, well versed in real estate law and practice, but not too many of us do. We also need to take into account whether they can walk the talk, their level of experience, and their motivation – what’s in it for them. As I said, it’s a minefield.

Guiding you through each process, each and every step, the barrier between you and the predator agents (not all agents) who can sniff out the innocent and inexperienced from a kilometre away, is essentially what I do for many clients. Explaining the dialogue, guiding you, working with you, on your side, and by your side. Listening, respecting, helping with clarity, communication, from this home to the next.

Home. Not Buying a Lemon

A lemon is often referred to as a car that once you drive it off the lot/car yard, it immediately springs a leak, springs a valve, springs something that the mechanics can never quite fix. Even the experts who manufacture the thing can’t figure it out.

Houses can also be lemons, the money pits where you are throwing money at it constantly to no avail. You want to replace the kitchen but the floors are uneven and fixing leads from one thing to the next, you want to add a garage but the overlays won’t allow it and you have to work with what you have. A home has many things that can go wrong and some excel at it.

A lemon can also be the home where you bought it high on emotion and low on logic. You loved the front entry, the four car garage, the brand new kitchen, and bathrooms, it was perfect. Until it was not. The front entry was nice but the house is too small. The four car garage is great but the house is too small and you can’t live in the garage. The new kitchen is beautiful but there is no natural light and it was Jerry built not Clive built (it’s an old ad where Clive was an excellent builder and Jerry was a diy (do it yourself) who had no idea, no experience and relied on Youtube). The bathroom. Well, let’s not even go there. The plumbing isn’t correct, and sometimes, not even connected.

What do you do?

Do you fix everything that you can, chalk it up to a bad experience, a lesson in life, and sell it?

Do you stay and be miserable?

Far better is to get it right from the beginning. Get clarity, get a building and pest inspection, find out about the zones and overlays, have an independent guide that will keep you on track, and who will let you know that the house is a lemon, and totally not suitable for you. Of course, it’s your decision that buys the house, always, all I can do is guide you along the wiser path.

Home. Not Buying the Wrong Home

Longevity, wanting to make sure it’s the right home. Being able to see your future in the home, Imagining a life where you walk to the railway station, walk to your new hobby, walk to lunch with friends. Or the opposite. Imagining a life where you can’t see your neighbours, it’s peaceful, it’s your own space. Home means many things and buying the right home means giving careful consideration, really thinking about it. How long do you intend living in your new home? Will it still suit you in 5 years, 10, 20? It’s not to say that this home needs to suit you forever, it needs to suit you now, and you need to consider your next step even if it’s a distant step.

If it’s a distant step then other factors come into play. Can you improve the home’s marketability, make some changes that suit you but improve the value? Keep some money aside to work on the home, to maintain it. Having a plan is important, particularly as we age. Buying a home when you are 60 or 70 is completely different to buying a home when you are 40.

Again, we discuss and clarify. What are the prospects? Could you keep this next home until you outgrow it, buy the next home, and rent this home out? How does it all fit with your current needs and your future needs. Of course, life makes changes but it never hurts to consider different aspects.

Buying the wrong home means that it won’t be too long and you will be back on the home search trail, of weekends at Open for Inspections, agents ringing, emailing, texting you and that doesn’t even cover selling the home.

Clarity before you buy is vital. Work it through. You don’t need to go it alone, Let’s chat.

Home. Not Going it Alone

Your first home by yourself, all the decisions lie with you. No one that has different criteria who you will have to compromise your dream home to make them happy. It’s yours and yours alone. Wow! Freedom.

Freedom can come at a price. All the decisions lie with you. ALL OF THEM.

Having a friend to explore homes with, to point out the good, the bad, and the ugly, is wonderful until you realise they have a vested interest. They want you to buy a home that works for them. The outside spa or pool where they can spend many happy hours, the location close to them, close to the shops, the pub, the station. True independent advice rarely comes from someone we love.

It’s your home not theirs, not their interpretation of how your life should look, or be.

Do you have absolute clarity about what you want, what you need, what you must have in your new home? Are you easily swayed by others’ opinions? How much influence will your friends and family have over your new home? Of course, we want them to love our new home, we want them to visit, but will you let them dictate to you?

Sorting it out right from the start, standing firm, comes with clarity, comes from the confidence you build when you have independent expert guidance. Doing it alone can be an amazing experience, it can transform your life. I love the joy when my clients have gone it alone, bought their dream home, and life is working out just how they foresee it.

Home buying with the right guide beside you

As we start to look ahead to 2026 and our impending new year resolutions or our goals that we seek at some point in the year of the Fire Horse. (The Fire horse is a combination of the zodiac animal and the zodiac element).

So, what are you looking forward to in 2026?

Are you planning a move? Maybe a downsize? Maybe taking on this beautiful big country and caravanning around it?

Maybe it’s more about you.

Learning yoga, walking every day, taking a class at U3A, the local community house, maybe a unit at University?

It’s exciting to think of all the possibilities of a new year.

One of the toughest decisions is just making a choice. It’s the same when you are buying a house, it starts with a choice.

Your preferred area.

Your preferred budget.

Your preferred criteria – floorplan, walkability, garden.

There are many choices, so many decisions to make.

Getting back to the ‘buying a lemon’, buying the wrong house, overpaying, lacking the time, knowledge, and how to. These are my people. These are the people who need me as their guide, their voice of experience, of know-how.

I have varying levels of assistance, and I am sure I can create one that works for you.

Let’s chat, let’s get clarity, let’s build your confidence.