I want to buy a house; just a house…

Hi ruf,
You need to consider the transport cost of your strategy.
Sanjiv

“There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.” – Nelson Mandela

If you search on Realestate.com.au and search in your area between $0 and $50000 a few usually pop up. Give that a go.

People actually offer them for free in the papers if your in the right place at the right time .
The removing and relocations the killer but l have two friends that both did it for 30 and 50,000 .
Personally l think the 50,000 one should have built a new one for what he ended up with though , the other one was very nice considering.
Cheers.

Have a look in the yellow pages under House Movers (Removers). They are generally listed with or near House Restumpers. These guys will be able to fill you in on the correct proceedure. Get several quotes and ask to see or speak to previous customers. As for the house, you will quite commonly find them for free or very little money in the Sydney area, particularly where land values have increased greatly. I helped my parents organised the remaoval of one from North Sydney to regional northern NSW. The house had been fully renovated 2 years prior and the only obligation was to clean the site (less than 10K and taken care of by the house movers). They ended up with a completed house for about $90K
Things to consider
– Cost of relocation (the above was $55K to move 500 kms away)
– Council approval a) to remove the house and b) to put in on your block
– RTA approval to transport (there are rules governing the time of day very large loads can be on the road, access for the vechicles, they must have pilot vechicles and ours needed police escort when going through towns where there wasnt a bypass- bit of an overkill, but rules are rules!!!)
– how much will you need to do to the house at the end? That is not only any desired renovations but also the cosmetics of plastering and repainting where they have cut the house in two. They literally take a great big chainsaw and cut it up. At the end they are only responsible for putting it back togehter so it is structurally sound and waterproof (supposedly)
– check out if the mover will also be the restumper or do you need another guy – more $$
– be very nice to your local council, htey need to approve it coming, as well as the putting it back together and be satisfied to give a certicicate of occupancy ie it will need an engineers thumbs up,
– plumbing and electrical reconections
– re the house mover, check how to pay them. Strongly recommend that at least a large portion not paid until an engineer inspects.
Sorry for being long winded, and I probably have left a few things off. I agree that tit is certainly a viable option –IF– all the due dilegence is done correctly.

All the best and if I can offer anything else please ask. PS sorry I cant recommend the guys we used, too many of the piers were incorrect causing cracks to appear up to 6months later hence the reccommendation to see and speak to previous customers. There are a few cowboys, but I am sure there are quite reputable guys as well. Good luck in finding them.
Tammy[biggrin]

Just througth i would add to this forum with our experiences we had with trying to buy a removal home in brisbane a couple of years ago.First up go to your local council first talk to them about what they require ,because we did before we went searching for a house and what the council told us the requirements where and what the removalists tell you are worlds apart and you could find yourself up for a massive amount of money to get the house up to council requirements,talk to your council before signing any contract or you may get burnt.you have to get council aproval to move the house if it's not up to scratch they will reject it .Do not let the removalist people tell you they can get inderpendent aproval they just want a sale .go to council.                                                                                                                                                                                                                          We looked at a house that was advertised in the paper and went to brissy to look at it.Loved it agreeded to buy it .then all the fun started.We wanted a contract to outline everthing and the couple selling it said no no ,no contract warning bells rang  and rightly so.We smelt a rat ,I rang a guy I know who own's a house removal company and told him what was going on.We got warned not to sign anything,and to try and find out who the owners of the house really were.Well we managed to track them down to Tasmania and rang them.Boy did we learn some things.The guy selling the house had told the owners all he could sell the house was $12,000 and they were going to give him $3,000 as commision.Wehad agreed to buy the house for $29,000.and we had to pay the removal from the site.As soon as we said we wanted to get our own removalist to do the job bang ,no I will not sell you this house.We were also told there was no time limit to move the house,wrong again it had to be off the site in 2 weeks.,or the developers would put a dozer throught it even throught we would have owned it.Well it turns out that we would have no comeback on this.We would have been ripped off. We would have got a phone call to get the house off the property 24 hours before the developers takeing pocesson of the property,and it takes 6weeks to go throught all the council process to do a move.So no way could that house be moved,we would have lost $29,000.Now from what I was told It appears the couple trying to sell us the house already had permits in place to move the house out 24 hours after the developers took over the site as the developers don't care what happens to the house as they took ownership of the site and anything on it.So the couple go to the developers and say look we'll take the house off your hands for free save you having to clear it .They move it to a pre arranged storage depot and sell it again.SO people be very carefull deal with a removalist company not privateley.There's alot of good ones out there I know we dealt with most of them trying to get the right house,but unsucessfully ended up selling the block and buying a existing home.So MARK and COLLEEN now be warned it's now out there in the public domain I only hope no one else gets burnt by you……                               

hello again.I'm glad that someone out there read my posting and got some usefull info/advise out of it.It's inspired me to put up  some more.                                               Like anyone looking for a removal home for the first time we were very green to it.We had a colonial cottage burn down ,not a very nice experience I can tell you.We saw getting a removal house as a good option ,we found it is far from a cheap option it's all the hidden costs that add up that are the killer.THe council bond of $20,000 before you move the house it gets paid back as you complete the required work on the house to council spec's.the bond you have to pay for possible damages to the councils that the house has to pass througth during it's move for trees sign posts etc and bond to the electricity co's for moving or repairing power lines ,god it add's up.When looking at these houses if thry are still on site not in a holding yard count the number of them in the street if there's 3  or less in the street your've got a rat,the house can not be moved it is subject to heritage listing ,if there is 4 or more of the same sort of house in the street you're fine it can be moved legally.                           Something you really have to be aware of is ASBESTOS that nasty word can cost you a fortune to remove.The front veranders of old qlders if they have been closed in are more than likely lined with asbestos fibro sase goes for the kitchen and bathrooms if they are in the rear verander and what was originally a open verander closed in to put them inside the house the walls and ceilling are 9 times out of 10 abestos fibro.These houses can not even be moved unless this stuff is removed first.                The next thing to worry about ,yeah there's more .the roofing iron if it's oud and not to good it will have to be replaced,some removalists will say in there adverts that they will supply new tin,it's normally down graded second grade product [cheap and nasty.guttering the same story if it's rusty or damaged it's got to be replaced .wiring depending on age [the old plastic coated stuff has to be replaced.Kitchen and bathroom normally you guessed it have to be replaced.IT's not a cheap thing to do by any means,but if your'e hell bent on a old qlder you don't have a hell of a lot of choice.You could always just buy an existing house and save a fortune and a lot of stress,in our curcumstance thats what happened .Unless your very good with the tools and got lots of time to put into doing one of these houses have a think about buying an existing one.I'm going to be very bold here why not look at some where like BOONAH it's a hell of a nice town still good prices and lot's of bueatifull old qlders.Only 30 minutes to Ipswich there's a workers bus in the morning and night to and from the transit centre at Ipswich catch the train to brissy no traffic stress beleive me it's the way to go.No traffic headaches.