Was it just a year or two ago that homes going up for sale had queues at the door of each exhibition; that agents of properties for auction were besieged with desperate buyers trying to close the deal ahead of the scheduled date? How times have changed.
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A reader with an expanding family is seeking advice on turning a small utility room into a bedroom for a twenty-something daughter who has just returned home after living away at university followed by 12 months of travel. Since she left her twin brothers, who used to share, now have bedrooms of their own.
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How productive is your back garden? Have you toyed with the idea of getting some return from your patch of dirt but reluctantly decided you just don’t have the time or energy, or that the area is too small to make it worthwhile?
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Australians now drink more wine (per person per glass) than Britons, Americans and New Zealanders. A survey has shown that in a four-week period 55 per cent of Australians of drinking age drank, on average, 21 glasses. Clearly we are becoming a wine drinking nation.
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It seems that the bushfire season is getting longer with every passing year, to the point when there is no longer any time when residents in fire-prone areas can relax their guard.
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The property market has slowed considerably and homeowners are wondering whether the cost of their planned improvements will be recouped when they sell. The answer is: It depends on the improvements.
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A shower is great for getting you awake and sparkling for the working day, or for a quick freshen-up before a night on the town, but it’s hard to beat the therapeutic value of a nice long soak when there is time to spare.
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With climatologists warning our summers are going to get ever hotter and the drought seemingly endless, there is a lively debate in progress over the future of backyard swimming pools.
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Easy to maintain, efficient and simple, patios can be calming, private places that allow you to unwind after a long day at work.
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Maybe you would like to make changes to your home but don’t have the money or the inclination to undergo a major renovation. One quick and relatively inexpensive way of affecting a transformation is through a new colour scheme.
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Have the best of both worlds through the installation of glass sliding walls which still allow uninterrupted views when closed and have configurations to suit any arrangement, from the dining room to the home theatre.
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Sixty years ago a sizeable proportion of Australian homes still had outside toilets? Moving the loo inside was at the cutting edge of bathroom design in and since then bathrooms have been the greyhounds of home design.
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Research in Britain suggests that it takes just eight seconds for a prospective home buyer to decide against buying a property - or to keep an open mind and investigate further. In other words, first impressions count for a great deal. It means that the approach to the home you want to sell and the front door take on an importance disproportionate to what lies inside.
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Domestic workshops are a difficult subject. They tend to be intensely personal places and people who own and actually use one jealously defend their modus operandi as “working for them”. Any attempt to impose a system or lay-out for such places is often deeply resented.
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Kitchens and bathrooms, once dismissed as the necessary but purely utilitarian parts of the home, are now often the jewels in its crown.
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