Departures: trimming housing fat with slimline model

Age
Thursday 1/5/2008 Page: 8

STRUGGLING home buyers will soon be able to choose from cheaper, smaller and more energy-efficient houses rather than big homes with all the "bells and whistles", Planning Minister Justin Madden has vowed. Launching Melbourne's newest suburb,"Williams Landing", at the former RAAF Laverton Airfield south-west of the city, Mr Madden said the developer would offer a range of new houses with smaller house sizes offered to increase affordability and sustainability.

Mr Madden caused a storm last year when he suggested some large homes were "McMansions" that suffered housing "obesity." He said the developer, Cedar Woods, had said rather than providing "the large house on the block, bells and whistles, four or five bedrooms, what they are going to show I understand is a range of options where you can upgrade your house and extend it over time."

He said the new suburb, which will accommodate up to 2000 new homes, would allow people to build in a "modular way", where they could add to the size of their home. Mr Madden said a "lot of people feel compelled to take up the big house straight away because it's an attractive option, an attractive model, but we do know that that puts a lot of burden on households, particularly if they have got a large mortgage."

The new suburb will have its own train station, 55 hectares of conservation areas and 15 hectares of landscaped open space. Meanwhile, Mr Madden backed new rules that come into force today in Victoria requiring all major house renovations to conform with five-star energy standards.

The new renovation rules will increase slightly the cost of renovating up to 40,000 homes a year across the state. The five star standard has been compulsory for new homes in Victoria since 2004 but almost all pre- 2002 homes have an average star rating of 2.3.

The Master Builders Association welcomed the new renovation rules and said 2 million homes in Victoria did not meet national energy efficiency standards. The new renovation rules will apply only to alterations that require a building permit and apply to building materials. They do not require a solar hot water system or a rainwater tank for toilet flushing.

Alterations that are more than 50% of the original volume of your home will require the existing home to be brought up to five-star standard and any extension greater than 25% of floor area of an existing home or 1000 square metres must fully comply with the new energy efficiency regulations.