The saying may go that your home is your castle – but there is more than one type of home with residences in Australia coming in a variety of forms.<\/p>\n
There is of course, the free-standing house which has long been the home of choice for Australians.<\/p>\n
However, urban density, rising prices and lifestyle choices have opened up many more types of home from a townhouse, terrace, semi, duplex and villa all on offer.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Different Types of Houses<\/strong><\/p>\n It is important to be aware of the variety of housing options available – along with their advantages and disadvantages – when entering the property market.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n House<\/strong><\/p>\n Think of the \u201cgreat Australian dream\u201d and a freestanding house of a quarter acre block may come to mind. It\u2019s long been a desired form of housing with good reason.<\/p>\n Owning a house puts you in control of your domain, there are no other owners involved, and so no others to consult if renovations or rebuilding are part of your plans.<\/p>\n The freestanding house has historically been our most common form of housing, and with the advent of COVID and lockdowns, they have gained even greater favour.<\/p>\n Typically larger than adjoined homes or apartments, and with a larger amount of private outdoor space they are an oasis when stay-at-home orders come in.<\/p>\n Not surprisingly this has increased their value even more with recent figures from CoreLogic showing a 30.5 per cent gap between house and unit prices at the end of June 2020, the highest on record.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Townhouse<\/strong><\/p>\n If high prices put you out of the house market, or you prefer something with a little less maintenance a townhouse may be an option for you.<\/p>\n A townhouse is a multi-storey building, usually two-storeys, and inside has the feeling of a house.<\/p>\n However, it is attached to other townhouses and is built as one of a series of homes.<\/p>\n Outside space is typically smaller than a freestanding home, and similar in style to a terrace courtyard.<\/p>\n The big difference between a freestanding house and a townhouse is around ownership conditions.<\/p>\n You are buying into strata ownership, which means you own common areas in common with your neighbours.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Terrace<\/strong><\/p>\n Before townhouses, there were terraces, a terrace is an individually owned home that is attached to a number of other homes by common walls.<\/p>\n Rows of terraces are most commonly found in the inner-city, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne.<\/p>\n However they can also be found in more historical regional cities, highly prized today, terraces were the first examples of developer-built homes.<\/p>\n Many rows of terraces were built by one owner then rented out and at the beginning of last century were some of the less desirable housing.<\/p>\n That is not the case today, with terrace dominated suburbs such as Sydney\u2019s Paddington and Balmain, some of the city’s most expensive.<\/p>\n They are a stylish and convenient city living option – with suburbs where they are housed typically close to CBDs<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Semi-detached<\/strong><\/p>\n Often referred to simply as a semi, semi-detached homes are a halfway mark between a terrace and a freestanding home.<\/p>\n Like a terrace, they are attached to another home, however a true semi consists of just two homes that are attached and share a common roof and one wall.<\/p>\n Unlike a terrace, they have a side passage down the side of the home that is not attached and windows along here can let in more light than terraces.<\/p>\n In Australia, they were a popular style of building for \u2018spec builders\u2019 – the earliest form of developer to construct in the years before and after Federation.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n